Budget Warriors
by MadVoorpak
Summary: Your Equipment is made by the lowest bidder, Follow the Budget Warriors in the Dropship Rusty Nail across the inner sphere in their fight for money, for honor, for recognition but most of all.. for waffles.
1. Humble Beginnings

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is Built by the Lowest Bidder

Writers Note / Disclaimer: I dont not own any characters, or things from Battletech. I would greatly appreciate anyone messaging me spelling or grammatical corrections (including this disclaimer: P ) Warning to any hardcore BT fans, I may get some history or info incorrect, I am very happy to fix if you tell me. Thanks ! This Fanfic is actually based on my Real Life Battletech Campaign which is still on-going

Futher note, since this is based heavily on my campaign ( both locations, battles etc ) most if not all mechs in the unit will be probably nonstandard ( which means I may have mis-understood some of the BT lore if they are modded to easily)

I will probably put up unit and mech info at some point

Italics is either whispers, or thoughts. Bold is yelling or computer text. In future i am aiming to have at least 5-10,000 words a chapter as a personal goal, and at the moment I am reaching around 2-3,000

This chapter has been edited to fix spelling and formatting errors, it has also been re-written, next is chapter 2 and so on.

Solaris VII 2972 February 3rd

Solaris, The modern Rome in a time of planet spanning wars and unimaginable destruction, The glorification of manmade gods of steel and wrath evident as people of all cultures races and houses jostle and push their way to the grand stadiums that dotted the planet, however unlike most tales of grandeur, of adventure and of greatness this one does not start off at the top not even remotely close. Infact, it seems to start quite close to the bottom.

As the greatest, grandest and most skilled warriors fought in arena's of twisted metal and scorched sand, while the crowds cheered on and howled their blood-lust cheering for their champions. A young man stepped in the cockpit of his mech, hands jittery with nervous energy.

"Atun!" A Voice cried from the foot of the hulking metal giant just as the pilot had seated himself a feeling of great power filling him as he began the start-up procedures before he noticed the voice pushing himself up and out to look down at the speaker he asked

"What is it? What could you possibly say that could help me in this situation? I'm going to die and that's final." The pilot, Atun said with a grim finality, a look of acceptance plastered onto his wiry face as he looked down. He wasn't a mech warrior, he was a coward. A washout from a DCMS academy, but for some reason he boss had faith in him.

"Can it you whiny bugger, you're from the Draconis combine!" the man yelled, mirth laced his voice as he disconnected the coolant pipes from the mech "Wheres your honour and bravery? I thought all you of all people wanted this." His comments were made in jest, his tone laced with a sense of familiarity which could have only come from years of personal experience with the pilot.

"Its back on Luthien! There's a reason why I have a dishonourable discharge, apparently running from combat is frowned upon." Atun sat himself back down in the cockpit, muttering obscenities under his breath, reaching forward he picked up his neurohelemt, an older design; Jury-rigged and patched together with whatever could be found. He noted this glumly as the box like helmet slid over his head, firmly sliding into place.

"State voice recognition code." his screen flashed, as the cockpit canopy closed around him, sealing itself with a hiss.

"Why fight today, when you can run away and live tomorrow." Atun recited, as he pressed down on the foot pedals and triggered his jump jets directing his mech backwards as if it were operational; A voice command was not the only thing required to finalised the activation of his mech. Urbanmech or no, it still was a multi-million C-bill machine.

"Passcode accepted, your still alive eh?" quickly flashed across his screen before his mech's various functions came online. The twisted sense of humour that was the hallmark of both the chief technician and his boss of Budget Enterprises reared its ugly head.

A grin flashed across Atun's face as the fusion engine in his mech throttled to life, his jump jet vents flared briefly for a moment before they died back down to standby venting the initial blast of super-heated air away from the mech, gripping the controls, he tested out the arm pods on his mech, the familiar feel of the cool hard plastic on his hand calmed him, as did the heavy coolant vest draped over his body, checking the weapon readout he was pleased to note his PPC and medium lasers were functioning fine not to mention the heat sinks were working which was an excellent sign, after all when Janos had bought them they were little more than boxes with holes.. Activating his communications unit with a small flick of a button, he waited for a response.

The man at the foot of the mech, scurried away hurriedly slapping on a headset as he made his way to his seat in the arena, for a brief moment he felt a passing pang of fear, the ground rumbled with the sound of far off explosions. His future lied at the foot of this untested pilot, drawing on reserves of Gusto and bravado he didn't know he had he quickly answered the waiting call

"G'day, Janos the tech here, Budget Enterprises at your service, what can we be doin for you today?" He drawled his trusty sales pitch, which admittedly did not work very often. But it worked enough that he had food on his plate, parts in his mech-bay and fuel for his vessel.

"Can it Janos," was the forthwith response from his headset, "please tell me you bet on the other guy." Atun's voice was almost pleading, a desperate quality tinged his voice

"No luck here kiddo, the last savings are on you and that trashcan of yours." Janos responded cheekily, before shutting off the communications unit before Atun could respond. Deep down, it was also to stop himself for breaking down in earshot of Atun. Every scrap of confidence, of luck was needed.

Fuming, Atun throttled his mech up to its maximum speed of an astounding 32kmph, once again the feelings of power and of greatness returned as with the heavy footfalls of his mech he exited the bay. Those feelings of power disappeared the moment he exited the mech bay and the doors slammed shut behind him. He realised just how small he truly was when he stared into the open arena, its true size staggering him.

"Hrrmm.. I swear it was smaller from up there." The domed head of his Urbanmech turned to a random portion of the arena, as if studying the crowd while the loud voice of the announcer boomed over old speaker systems.

"Welcome one, welcome all to the starting match of the day. Today, in the red corner we have our ring favourite Mark the pilot of that gorgeous red Valkyrie" As the announcers voice bellowed out over the arena speakers, a confident looking mech strode out into the field admits cries of adoring women, cheering fans and vocally brutish viewers just their for the oil to run freely across the ground.

" Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnd in the blue corner, we have a newcomer to Solaris, Atun Zushen piloting the.." pausing for a moment he laughed softly. "It appears our newcomer pilots a trashcan!" the laughter quickly cut off as the announcement system died to a static, but the laughter was picked up by the crowed. Jaded to the enormity and rare form of battlemechs, the crowds of the arena voiced their displeasure at such an ill-regarded mech, forgetting that it was still capable of immense destruction.

As if goaded by the laughter, the Urbanmech broke out into a run, its slow ponderous waddle unusual for a mech of its weight size bringing it slowly to the designated starting zone, Its movements were slow, harsh and symptom of both a relatively inexperienced pilot and old, rebuilt equipment.

He shut down and filtered out the external audio input, desperately trying to regain his own composure. A solitary tear trailed down his cheek as he looked upon the steel form of his opponent. Taking solace in old traditions, Atun pushed his mech forward slightly into a bow, as he was taught back in his academy. That was his first mistake, bringing the mech back upright he saw a volley of missiles streak their way through the skies towards him. His flight reflexes kicked in, legs depressing control pedals which sent the Urbanmech on a similar path backwards, the initial volley of missiles exploding in front of him harmlessly, a scant ten meters between himself and the impact site.

"As you can see here folks, the Urbie is essentially useless at this sort of range, lacking the speed to close with the Valkyrie even in this close environment. The pilot stands little chance of bringing his firepower to bay, however if he can outlast the ammo of the Valkyrie his superior close range firepower might carry him through" The announcer kept up his running commentary, as the 'little' mech danced about the field sprinting slowly from patch of ground to ditch, arcing through the air whenever the Valkyrie was close to scoring a hit.

Three volleys soar through the air, thirty missiles in the space of thirty seconds. Seven had found their mark, the machines of war eager to scratch out their own meagre mark on the universe upon the patchwork and crudely rebuilt form of the Urbanmech. Atun swore and screamed in both panic and anger as the explosive payloads tore rents and holes into the armour of his mech, slabs of expensive and precious plate disappearing before his very eyes as the missiles worked inwards through his torso.

Quick to recover, only the thought of destitution and a life of insignificance kept him focused and a mere hairsbreadth away from giving up, likewise Janos had torn his hat into quarters, and was beginning to progress into octuples as he contemplated the finer intricacies of bankruptcy, business was slow. And this was his last chance to get off planet.

"As of yet fans, we have yet to see the Urbie fire a shot, however as most astute watchers may be noticing, there is alot more armour on this particular trash can then you would usually find." One of the arena announcers was astute enough to notice that the Urbanmech swung from side to side more ponderously then it should, its domed and blocky profile more rigid and fuller than usual. Down to slightly above half missile load, the Valkyrie pilot came to a similar realisation.

Half crying, half laughing Atun drove the mech from his latest patch of cover, following an audience wide gasp, which was visible but in audible the Valkyrie had ceased its movement for a few precious seconds, seconds enough that the Urbanmech closed the distance enough to use its primary weapon. Time seemed to stop, at least all sound did. The moment Atun mashed down on the firing studs that adorned his controls, the crowd gasped and aah'd in excited men. Instead of the whirring fire of a massive cannon, and the visible blur of a high velocity shell the crowd was ill-rewarded with the electrified blue streak of man made lightening.

The solitary PPC bolt slashed through the air, impacting solidly into the centre torso of the stationary Valkyrie, melting armour and sending rivers of molten alloys cascading down into the ground below. The crowd burst into loud and awe-struck cheering, all inaudible to the frantically moving Urbanmech pilot.

The Valkyrie began to frantically back away, a sixth volley of missiles going wide as it jumped backwards, its pilot obviously afraid of the implications that came with the Urbanmech mounting a particle projection cannon. Atun would have none of the cowardice that he was being shown, his own feet slammed down onto his jump pedals, the air becoming increasingly hard to breath as warmth flooded his cockpit.

"Waffle it!" He cried, a heat sink flashed red on his sub-system display panel, the cause of his elevated temperature suddenly evident. The Valkyrie had put sixty or so metres between itself and the Urbanmech, but it was not enough. His PPC chimed its malicious green signal light, the air returning to a normal temperature. The reprise was brief, another bolt of wrathful energy eagerly sought out the first's impact site, eager to join its kin. Atun groaned in disappointment, but the crowd and Janos jumped and cheered. While not in the same location, the line etched its way across the right torso of the red mech, exposing layers of silver armour hidden beneath its torn skin.

The game had changed. The prey had teeth, and it was not afraid to use them.

Its right arm weapon pod glowed with heat, as the heat sinks mounted in place of the auto-cannon furiously worked to dissipate the increased heat load. The Valkyrie having no such problem burst out from its hiding place trailing a plume of fire and smoke, its significantly more experienced pilot scoring a half score of hits across the torso of the Urbanmech as the Valkyrie landed on a nearby rubble pile. Running at top speed Atun hesitated to trigger his jets again, he was lucky so far that nothing blew up, and he had landed in one piece. Not wishing to chance fate, his plodding gate carried him ever closer to the slowly approaching form of the Valkryie.

Suddenly circuitry and wiring exploded from the left side and arm of his mech, Atun shrieked in horror, unknowingly echoing the cries of his employer and friend who watched helplessly from the sidelines. More warning indicators turned from their original peaceful shade of green, to a much more violent and ominous shade of red. Missiles continued to rain down upon his mech, Atun fought with his controls desperately attempting to stay upright amidst the rain of fire and metal. Armour hung limply from exposed skeletal limbs, the blue drip of coolant fluid leaked steadily from an exposed heatsink. But above all else, above the scars and the fire, the mech was still standing.

The crowd tensed in excitement, the killing blow was soon to come. The Valkyrie charged in, swift and almost completely un-marred form charing in for the final stroke, its left arm raised and poised to deliver the final stroke. It was the end, but Atun had more to say. Roaring and screaming aloud his fear, and what was left of his hope his mech broke into a shambling run, swaying uneasily from side to side streaks of blue vengeance streaked from the cracked casing of his right arm gun pod, the PPC bolts striking meter long craters into the sand and dirt, but twice gouging out sections of armour in vengeful fury.

The two mech's drew within spitting distance, a mere ninety metres stood between the two mechs and an end to the ongoing battle. The coolant dripping down the side of the Urbanmech began to boil and sizzle as it hit the ground, the PPC went silent as the left arm jerkily raised to counter the right arm salute of its opponent. A trio of ruby red lances of light stretched out and carved their deadly path through the central section of the Valkyrie, answered by the return of its amber coloured brother. Three lasers bore a hole into and through the Valkryie, one laser carved yet a deep gouge into the Urbanmech's head, both mechs continued moving forward another few gigantic steps, carrying them scant tens of metres before both tumbled to the ground, skidding in the sand.

The crowd grew silent once more, a trail of parts and circuitry lay behind the Valkyrie, its centre torso and valuable fusion engine now myth than fact lay scattered on the ground around it. Having removed himself from his mech, the Valkyrie pilot sat atop the ruined shell of his mech, watching as the clock ticked down. The battle however, was not won. Inside the head of his Mech, Atun lay unconscious, his prone form splayed over the blaring alarms of his controls the voice of Janos screaming loudly into his ear for him to awaken.

"WAKE UP YOU BASTARD!" Janos cried, desperately trying to wake his friend up, a loyal and entertaining assistant he would never find again. "Please, get up." He half sobbed, desperately he racked his mind for any way to wake him up, the clock ticked along in its final ten seconds, the crowd chanting along.

"3"

Years of metal conditioning, of training and of swatting his alarm clock had prepared atun for this one meaningful message.

"2"

"**"** Janos did his best impression of a high pitched, nasal alarm clock, and Atun responded brilliantly. His arm darted out, swatting a random buton, power flooded the Urbanmech's arm and the mech dutifully rolled onto its side.

It was enough, the clock ceased its torturous descent. Victory had come, and at a low price; one which joyfully fitted into the pockets of Budget Enterprises.

1:200 Odds were stacked against Atun. Against the odds he had prevailed, riches, riches enough to pay the debts long held against Janos were now in reach as the estatic technical squeezed through the opening pit doors and sprinted to the mech, Twelve million C-bills practically floating in his vision.

"IKNEWIT!" he cried, inputing the emergency override code and sliding open the canopy hatch, reaching inside to drag out Atun. "YOU WON!"

The only response from the near comatose pilot was a single line, one which would sum up his character both past, present and future.

"Five more minutes mom…"

_Rusty Nail Mechbay, Solaris VII _

_Feburary Fifth, 2972_

Atun limped gingerly into the mechbay, looking around slowly as he tenderly nursed a heavily bruised forehead among other body parts. He stood straighter and quickly narrowed his eyes.

"This seems suspicious." He muttered, kicking his way through lines of myomer bundles and power cabling, "Its too.. organised." He wiped his finger along the external casing of an autocannon, the kali-yama markings faded and barely visible. "Clean even!" His musings suddenly stopped as he walked into the foot of an Urbanmech, but it wasn't his.

Coming to a sudden realisation, he turned to one of the higher gantries and shouted as loud as his bruised ribs would let him; "JANOS! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?"

The greased back hair of the supreme technical officer, and overall smartass Janos popped out of the cockpit of the new, mostly intact trashcan.

"Yussum?" He responded cheerfully, somewhat absently testing the arm controls of the mech, waggling its arms around slightly to test its range of moment.

"Why is there a second mech Janos? Why is everything clean? And more importantly.. Why was there no bacon…" Atun started off his tirade and finished with a small whimper as he slowly climbed the crisscrossing roads of the mech-bay gantries, making his way to Janos.

"Ahh, didn't you get the internal memo?"

"No… I've been slightly out of the loop" Atun deadpanned, looking at his boss, and friend strangely.

"Ah, well I've cleared off all my debts, and with the remaining cash scored enough parts to patch up the main drive exhaust of this tub."

"And why are you doing that?" Atun was slightly confused, that money could of gone to a big workshop, penthouse and so on so forth until the end of their lives. To blow it all in three days paying debts and aqquiring parts seemed un-Janos like. Quickly brandishing a Interstellar-Ikea L bar he questioned the would be imposted. "Who are you and what have you done to my boss?"

"Relax you jumpy drac, I'm me, I've just decided to pursue my and now your life long dream."

Sighing, and leaning agiant the nearest sturdy object Atun knew this was his boss, no other person would so quickly change life dreams. Again. For the nineteenth time.

"So, what is it now."

"Budget Enterprises has started The Budget Warriors Mercenary Company, a sub-division of Budget Enterprises."

"…." Atun was shocked, not even in his wildest dreams; which were pretty wild if the hallucination of the penthouse filled with platinum haired beauties was to be an indication, couldn't have dreamt this one up. "Whaaa….?"

"I know its great huh, I scored us some surplus equipment, a scorpion hull I won in a card game yesterday, a fusion engine for the lil' bastard and an Urbanmech all for most of our pile of money, and an indiscriminate amount of software banned in two houses."

It might have been the concussion, the injuries or even the lack of acceptable nutrients and dietary supplements but Atun prompty fainted for the second time in almost as many days, leaving the now irate technician the job of hauling the man back to his bunk, granted Janos thanked the heavens and the local grocery market runs for making Atun light enough to carry.


	2. The New Guy, Whats he saying?

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is Built by the Lowest Bidder

Writers Note / Disclaimer: I made this chapter longer then the last! I am aiming for around about 5,000 to 7,000 words a chapter, but im barely scratching 2.5 at the moment, I apologies in advance for any poor grammar, English isn't my first language so my grammar sucks, but hopefully my spelling and use of words are correct. Onwards with the show! I also introduce you to the third PC!

Solaris VII 2972 February 10th

Stepping gingerly off the transport, Atun smoothed down the collar on his best clothes which amounted to a clean white shirt, a relatively spotless black vest and a pair of grey track pants which didn't have any holes in them. Making his way towards the small hall at the end of the street Atun kept his hand wrapped tightly around a bundle of papers in his jacket wary of any passerby that looked the slightest bit shifty.

_"Oh god.. Why this early in the morning"_ Atun yawned, as he reached the entrance of the building a small non-descript hall, with smooth clean doors which opened on squeaky hinges, the whole building itself looked squashed as it was placed squarely in between a pawn shop and a small holovid store. Fumbling with the keys, the slowly awakening mechwarrior unlocked the generator and started it by giving it a swift kick; the small motor roared into life, the lights in the building slowly began to awaken much like Atun as he rubbed his eyes.

_"Eh... Ive seen worse."_ he though to himself exploring the first floor, deciding that nothing of note lay on the first floor he ascended to the second where he found the sleeping quarters, nudging open the door he stepped inside feeling slightly adventurous, he poked one of the mattresses only to have a cloud of slightly off smelling green dust rise up and a very unamused colony of spiders scuttle to the next mattress. _"Although, not by much."_ Decided to leave the arachnid filled room of death till later, and preferably till he had backup and body armor Atun walked back down to the first floor after doing his rounds.

"Janos could of picked a lot worse, its serviceable and it will do for now.." Atun barely finished his sentance outloud before an annoying buzzing noise filled the rented building. "What now.." He grumbled, moving towards the door, opening it he came face to chest with a rather large and beefy individual, looking up he peered into the hairy mass that layed atop this mountain of flesh to see if intelligence lay within.

"Ahh Man, Is dis ben wherin we come to applah." Atun blinked once, twice and then a third time. Giving the man another look over, he invited him in "Yes.. this is the place." Shutting the door behind the towering man, Atun led him into a small room which he cleared out for purposes of interviews.

"Soo.. Mr...?" He let the sentence trail, waiting for the mystery man to fill in the gaps.

"Jacob, Ah be Jacob" He responded, Atun suspected it was either the hair or possibly an affliction that made his voice so unrecognisable.

"Right, I assume your here to try and join my small mercenary outfit?" shuffling several papers about, Atun attempted to find the file on this guy, if he even submitted one.

"Ya, I'vva been fightin for the big Marik man for years now, butten no more, because of den internal policies ah unit been all disbandud." A small grin of triump played across Atun's face as he found Jacbos file, granted it was just as hard to understand since his handwriting wasnt exactly legible.

"What makes you think your qualified to take this position?" Atun asked, coyly shuffling some papers back and forth to make himself seem important.

"Dats be an eeezz question mun." He gave Atun a big toothy grin, several white, gold and black teeth stared out at him "I be bein your only appalicant."

"Touche." Atun extended his hand, Jacob gingerly shook as to not break his employers hand, "Now to iron out the details.

* * *

"Ya know Atun, Half a lance is not exactly what i meant when i said Mercenary Company. I was thinking you know, more along the lines of.. an Actual company of mechs!" Janos chuckled as he spoke, cuffing Atun around the head lightly as the walked up the ramp into the bay of the Union, faded black letters on the side read simply "Rusty Nail".

"Well, I could only work with what was given, you only managed to find another mech!" Atun retorted, ducking to avoid the second swipe and vaulting over a small pile of supplies, sliding over the outer casing of a PPC Atun promptly tripped over several long and numerous bundles of myomer fiber. "And whats with all this junk? dont we have enough supplies in the aero-bays?" cautiously standing up, Atun navigated his way out of the mess and back onto mostly clear deck plating.

"You can never have too many supplies Atun. Never." shaking his head, Janos stood by the entrance ramp and looked out as if waiting for something.

"Wheres the second mech?" asked Atun, as he looked around the mech cubicals for the other mech in his lance.

"Oh your going to love it" Janos replied, rubbing his hands togethor, still looking out "I even landed us a contract, the same fellows looking to get rid of the mech were looking to hire some Mercenaries."

Atun was dimly aware of a increasingly strong thumping sound, peering outside the bay he saw an armless dome slowly plodding its way towards him.

"An Urbanmech?" he exclaimed in shock, almost falling out, "That's the best you could get?"

"Dont complain, it served you well enough, needs a bit of work tho, arms were shot off in battle and its got a faulty leg joint but nothing I cant fix, Especially on a trashcan, Gotta love em."

"Why?" Atun asked, stepping to the side as it slowed down to a crawl which wasnt much different to its full pace and slipped into its berth.

"Simple, its weaponry are in its arms which are both boxy pods attached to the arm joints, which means i can fix her up easily, in addition to modifying it to fit your urban's weapon load out without any structural modifications what so ever."

Atun nodded his understanding, waving to Jacob as he exited the mech he moved to close the hangar doors.

"not so fast Atun, we got more coming." Janos grabbed Atun by the shoulder, pulling him back as Jacob retrieved his stuff from a random pile behind them and moving off to his room

"More Mechs?" Atun asked, hope in his voice only to be crushed rather quickly when a small flat tank drove around the corner a trailer clumsily hitched to the rear

"Nope, a Scorpion" Janos gave Atun his best grin before he began the closing the bay doors after paying the delivery boys of course and safely bolting the small tank into a corner.

Atun continued grumbling and swearing as he navigated his way towards the command center, cursing 'them crazy technicians' and accursed 'davions'. Entering the bridge, Atun looked around and for the first time noticed something a little bit off, "Errm Janos..." He began, looking around nervously as both Jacob and Janos entered the room "Wheres the crew?"

"We're the crew!" Janos responded happily, punching in the start-up codes for the massive fusion reactor in the core of the ship. The deck plating rumbled, a dull roar could be heard before the reaction steadied itself and the power siphoned away to key systems.

"Ah Mun, Why do you be tinkin there be only wun applalcant, ur bossman be askin for many no duff qualifications" Jacob chipped in, moving over to one of the stations and getting himself settled in, rather aptly.

"Annnnd you decided NOT to mention this to me?" Atun said, cocking his head slightly and standing a bit to the side watching the two work.

"Well, I kinda hoped you would go with the flow and just learn how to fly." Janos said cheekily

"Ah mun, just go and taken those controls over there." Jacob replied, Atun suspected it was in a snarky and or sarcastic manner, but couldn't tell due to his accent. Sighing, Atun complied and moved over to the seat looking at the unfamiliar and strange controls. The take off was rather uneventful, Atun just had to make sure the heat indicators for the engine didn't reach a critical level and to make sure the weapons were all locked into standby mode, no sense in shooting up their ride. The small drop ship accelerated quickly, vast fiery trails of plasma and engine exhaust vented out from underneath it as the squat domed Union lifted off into the heavens.

"So how long untill we reach the Jumpship?" Atun queried, as he sat back in his chair all the hard work done; all that was left was to wait untill they were close enough to decelerate. "Coz this is boooooring."

Janos turned back around in his chair, rubbing his hands togethor, Jacob stood behind him furiously moving his hands in a "stop" gesture.

"Good thing your bored then, first things first; We need to fix up the second Urbanmech, re-condition its engine and give it a good once over, install the weaponry into the Urbanmech, some daily ship maintenance, stripping out the turret on the scorpion and replacing it with the long range missile launcher rack in the cargo bay.." Janos continued to list a number of things needed to be done as he grabbed both Atun and Jacob by the collar dragging them out towards the hanger bay floor.

"Ah no mun, why me" Jacob cried out, as he meekly followed the now visibly energetically bouncing technician, only getting more excited the closer he drew towards the hanger bays, Janos paused for a second, and happily answered in a parady of Jacobs accent, a poor one at that

"You bein da only applalicant"

* * *

Review Responses:

Ulquiorra9000 Ulquiorra9000 - Thanks, I didnt know what didnt pick up [b][/b] etc.. I dont actually know what a run on sentance is... D: also, the fight was not easy! those were fair odds, Slow short-medium range mech green pilot vs Veteran fast long range fire support mech. and trust me, We blew those 20 million c-bils fairly quickly buying parts, Urban and a scorpon cost us almost 7 mil c-bills things are not cheap.. GM works on the principle: Listed price = manufacturing cost, sale price = Base * unit type * weight catergory * adv tech or clan origin* which means most mechs in the light category got a 2-3 multiplier, and scorpions got a 2. Also, expect to see many more Urbanmechs later on in the story, 1. I love em, 2. Dirt Cheap 3. . You'll see.

Nui - Yup, I realize accents come across badly so i need to work on it more..

hope you all enjoy, keep R&R so i can make it better :D


	3. Are there Any Objections?

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I don't own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and a unamused colony of spiders.

Keep reading and reviewing folks! makes me happy :D I know, so Selfish right?

* * *

Solaris System 2972 February 18th

Atun groaned, rubbing his back as he rolled over slowly to swat the alarm clock, fingers coming down in a hard arc before impacted and squashing the evil red button. Rubbing his eyes and slowly opening them, he swore he could hear the cracking of his back. The intercom crackled to life and static played out for a few seconds, followed by a very loud and way to cheerful voice.

"Wakey wakey, eggs and bakey" Janos voice floated out of the small speaker mounted on the roof, the promise of bacon and eggs rousing Atun from him slumber he put on some overalls and pants and trudged his way towards the mess.

Opening the door with visible effort, Atun made note of another thing to fix before he sat down next to Jacob, his hair as flamboyant and messy as always. Quickly grabbing a fork and knife Atun hungrily dug into the meal in front of him, mumbling a thank you and hello as he munched on a piece of crunchy bacon.

"Ah mun, You should be happy today, We be dockin with the jumpship in an hour or so." Jacob said, raising his cup to his libs, behind his fringe of hair and drinking from it, watching intently Atun wondered how he did that without drinking in his hair also before he happily responded as the statement sunk in.

"Yes! No more work!" Atun responded happily, his face brightening up as he took another mouthful, managing to somehow talk while eating, but barely managing to speak legibly "All this maintenance is killing me" a few pieces of food enunciated his statement.

Janos chuckled, layering his food with some sauce he explained the finer details about mercenary life, and all the wonderful work it entailed.

"Basically, Since we are a small unit at the moment, You two will have to assist me in doing repair work on your own mechs, and any other equipment." Taking a rather large mouthful, and pausing to finish it he continued "Eventually, we might hire some other technicians and pilots but its not likely for awhile, we simply don't got the cash or the reputation. Techs are always in high demand, house units and prestigious merc units often grab em as soon as they appear, even the rookies."

"Ya mun, I only decided to join this here fine unit, because the big marik mun had given me a discharge from my home unit, no other merc unit was willing to hire me." Jacob chipped in his two cents, as another forkful of food disappeared behind his curtain of hair. "Ah just be glad you decided to hire me, and I be thankful for it little Atun mun."

"Riiiiiiiiiiiiight." Atun lent back in his chair, and gave a loud belch before rubbing his stomach, "So when do we get our mission details and briefing and what not. Hell, even where we are going" Atun gathered up the plates and dropped them in the wash tub that occupied a small space in the corner, making note to clean them at some point before turning to face Janos again.

Janos cleared his throat, picking a small piece of food from between his teeth he proceeded to inform both Atun and Jacob of what exactly was going to happen.

"Tis pretty simple lads," He began, rubbing his hands together and leaning forwards " when we meet up with the jump ship a liaison officer will come aboard to brief us on the specific mission details, we'll be jumping to a planet within a single jump across the border into free world league space " standing up, Janos began to head towards the bridge, talking every step of the way "some construction is taking place on the planet, a facility of some sort and were being hired to defend some smaller installations on planet while the main forces guard the new facility."

"Right, so we are there to make sure nothing gets busted right?" Atun queried, shutting the door behind him to the mess hall, Jacob having eased his way out before Atun.

"Yup," Janos responded sliding the bridge door open before stepping inside "Although, I find it stupid that the free worlds league would be building a facility this close to the border, but we are just lowly mercenaries, not a big time general or anything" Shrugging, he sat himself down at the controls making sure the final docking procedures would go smoothly.

Atun almost fell of his chair, when the archaic comms system, probably older then the star league crackled to life, which wouldn't surprise Atun considering that Janos had revealed this was the thirty second Union drop ship ever produced. The first few moments of the transmission were scratchy and barely audible before it cleared up, a feminine voice clearly stood out among the background sounds

"Rusty Nail, this is liason officer Laura Kemps, upon completion of the docking procedures I will be boarding your vessel to begin the mission briefing, we will be jumping moments later and our detachment and subsequent burn towards Amity will occur upon completion of the jump, Is this acceptable?" her tone brokered no objections, Janos quickly nodded vigorously, Atun being closest to the communications station responded.

"Err, this is Atun Zu lance leader of the Budget Warriors, we understood. Its acceptable...over?" Atun nervously responded, attempting to sound important, yet still very unsure.

"Excellent." The communications systems shut off moments later the staticy background noise ceasing to permate the room, Jacob lent back in his chair snickering violently, which for a man of his size and stature amounted to loud raucous laughter that shook the deck. Grumbling, Atun flicked a small piece of junk across the cabin impacting his head before bouncing off with a pathetic sounding ping, all of which only made him laugh harder.

His head down, and posture slumped Atun slinked off towards the docking port to meet the new arrival. Leaning casually on the opposing wall, Atun slicked back his black hair and waited patiently for the hatch to cycle. There was a brief hiss as the locks sealed the hull to space and pressure normalised between the two vessels. The door opened and Atun was struck speechless, What stepped through wasn't some ugly boring liaison, but a rather curvaceous and very beautiful looking officer.

"Ahem. Eyes up here lance leader." Kemps coughed, drawing Atuns head, and eyes upwards.

"Err, Right sorry Welcome to the Rusty Nail, meals are served at random times of the day, you'll have your own cabin for the duration of the mission and please try not to use up the hot water." Atun began to gain confidence while he spoke, before trailing off into incoherent ramblings as the image of Kemps in a shower with hot water took over his mind.

Giving the awestruck lance commander a scathing look and raising an eyebrow, Kemps stepped into the union before grabbing onto a rail, pulling herself deeper into the vessel, while Atun scrambled to lead the way.

"Lets meet the rest of the crew.." she said quietly, as the docking collar behind her disengaged with a kathunking noise, plucking her bag from the ceiling and brushing her platinum hair back behind her ears she trailed after the spinning draconian.

* * *

Solaris System 2972 Feburary 25h

Atun was bouncing around the hangar bay, nervous energy permeating every pore of his body as they began their landing procedures, the burn in towards the planet had been a hell in space for the most part, it was painfully obvious that their employers the Quickcell Corporation wanted every c-bills worth out of them with Kemp's continual quizzes and situational awareness tests Atun did admit it opened his eyes, and especially Jano's to how they would have to operate from then on out. Kemps had forcefully pointed out that Jano's needed to stop thinking like a solaris fan and more like a general if he wanted his unit to survive, poking holes in every one of his plans whilst simultaneously berating both Atun and Jacob for their battlemech skills.

But, in the final days before descent they had worked out a truce of some sorts, Kemps would stay in the dropship and act as a command and control centre allowing Janos to man the Scorpion and provide long range fire support to Jacob and Atun in their Urbanmechs. What Atun found most interesting was the continued negotiations of the contract, he had assumed it all bargained well and done back on Solaris but apparently not, as Janos and Kemps continued to argue over salvage rights and support.

In the end, they reached a settlement, Janos had re-negotiated for a forty percent salvage rights with first choice in addition to a ten percent reimbursement for any losses during combat, Apparently that was something to be happy over. Which was why Janos did the negotiating and Atun did the piloting. Atun knew exactly what he wanted, climbing up the scaffolding to the cockpit in his Urbanmech he thought to himself

"_Yup, the simple things in life.. Explosives, Waffles, Women, Waffles, Money, Waffles.." _sliding into his seat he looked across the bay to where Jacob was climbing into his mech, not knowing that he was having much similar thoughts..

"_Ah the simple things in life," _ pausing to check several blinking status icons, he continued his mental montage when everything flickered to green _" Money, Friends, Honour.. Good food.__" _keying in the reactor start up codes, Jacob looked down at Janos, giving a wave with his Urbanmechs smaller left arm as the technician climbed into the modified dual-gunner/driver seat of the Scorpion.

Janos looked between the two mechs above him, and prayed to what ever deity existing in the inner-sphere to show them some mercy, he slid into the modified seat of the Scorpion, modified in the way that the usual twin seater compartment had been completely stripped out, replacing the cheap electronics, fire control systems and control circuitry with slightly less cheap equipment removed from several downed mechs. With a targeting array ripped from a rather unlucky Archer, Janos was confident his improved upon Scorpion would actually work.

_"Equipment made by the second lowest bidder! things are looking up in my life now" _breaking out into a long loud laugh, he was unaware of the looks both Atun and Jacob were giving him along with the highly disapproving stare from Kemps, who had taken up position on one of the overhead railings, overseeing the disembarkation proceedures.

_"Madmen, Why did we have to hire madmen. Budget Warriors! it says it in their name for god's sakes." _Kemps smoothed out her hair and opened the hangar bay doors, duly noting that one of her precious platinum wisps had detached from her head, probably from stress, _"Bloody drac's..." _she thought to herself, blaming the sole ex-Draconis Combine citizen onboard, namely Atun.

Exiting the spaceport, the motley caravan of Urbanmechs trailed by the low and modified profile of the scorpion and with several trailers hitched between them, the trio headed towards the facility.

* * *

Review Responses: Note, if any of you guys think i need more details or stuff about parts of the fanfic like, more attention to character details or more details about what thier doing, please tell me so i can improve it to make everyone happy :D

Ulquiorra9000 - thanks, but i cant take all the credit for the humour the majority of the conversation is actually based off of our transcripts from in our game.. He may get some new toys, he may not. overall tho, its going to be an interesting few years for Atun'

Nui - Thanks :D, its good to know i'm coming across fairly clearly they'll be as much variation in mech's as there is in our actual campaign for reference we are around 2972 while my campaign finished in the year 3080 :P lots o fun to be had. There will be many vehicle varations, as i always liked tanks more then most mechs.. my fav things being the Urban Mech, the Clint, the LRM/SRM Carriers and the Ubiquitous Hertzer.


	4. The Lowest Bidder

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I dont own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and a unamused colony of spiders.

Keep reading and reviewing folks! makes me happy :D I know, so Selfish right?

* * *

Amity II, Amity System; February 28th

Reaching the Ore Refinery two days later, they immediately noticed one flaw with their plans to defend it; It was a very large facility. Large enough to warrant its own drop-ship landing hangar, noticing the massive bay doors and scorched landing pad Atun swore violently.

"Aaand there was a reason we couldn't land here?" Janos was suitable chaste when he responded.

"Well... Err... Um..." continuing on, he reached a bright conclusion "Kemps! Your our liaison with Quicksell, why couldn't we land here?"

The response was less then lackluster, the radio lapsed into silence for a few minutes as the small convey made its way towards the front gates, just before the slowed to a stop Kemps responded, with what they all assumed was a cheeky tone, never having heard her laugh before

"You never asked."

"Ah, wai you been doin dis to us boss lady?" Jacob cried out, his rear sore from sitting in the same seat more or less for two days, fortunately for him there was no response following suit behind Atun Jacob put his Urbanmech into a crouch, the stout little thirty tonner slowing to a stop and then kneeling slightly, hitting the release button on his cockpit hatch Jacob pulled himself over the side, sliding down the domed exterior until he reached the ladder down.

While Atun and Jacob were busy negotiating the treacherous climb down their respective mech's Janos had walked up to the guard house and waved over the guard

"Hey, Let us in!" banging on the glass window of the both, he peered inside

**"Goddamfarkingmercenaries..."** Janos stumbled back as the crusty voice of the hundred year old looking guard boomed out of the tinny speaker system mounted above his head, **"Sorriest sack of mercenaries i've ever scene" **The stream of profanities seemed endless although it did slow just slightly; Janos wondered if the old man breathed at all as he stepped back into his tank, the boom gate swinging upwards on hinges.

Even as they continued into the main compound the guards voice continued to rattle out behind them, Atun dryly commented as he climbed back into his mech

"Why do we need these ID cards anyway.." only to be cut off by the loudspeaker as it kicked up in volume another notch.

**"Never know who might just shoot you up if you dont keep em on ya"**

"Wait, Did he just threaten us?" The Torso of Atuns Urbanmech turned to the left, its PPC coming up and tracking the small guardhouse, before decided it was not worth the expenditure in energy, he turned away and throttled up to a run, catching up to the other two. They continued along for a good hundred meters before they came up to the large cement ramp which lead up into the loading bays, massive caterpillar treads lay on the far side with large slabs of ore rolling off onto waiting flatbed trucks, the sound of several hundred ton hammers audible in the background as they traveled into the heart of the massive facility. keeping a weary eye out, Atun whistled appreciatively at the massive grinding jaws that periodically came down from the ceiling to smash the waste rocks into smaller manageable chunks.

"Wow, talk about heavy machinery.. I feel small." shuddering slightly as a mech sized boulder was reduced to a field of pebbles.

"No kiddin man, dese here bein some big toys." Whistling appreciatively Jacob kept his mechs arms near to its body. Eventually the trio came to a large cleared out store room, they could tell it was recently 'cleared' out as the previous occupants, a broken husk of a large vehicle was crammed to one side. several quick sets of construction scaffolding had been erected as a form of temporary mech bay while large shipping contains stood to the side filled with miscellaneous iron scrap.

"Ahhhhhh Home sweet home eh?" Janos exclaimed, exiting from the side of the tank and giving the trailer a swift kick, the abused metal pin fell out of its socket without complaint, the trailer itself falling to the ground with a large thud moments later, "Well then, hurry up you lot the tents arnt going to unpack themselves."

Atun groaned, navigating his way down the scaffolding faster, but probably not safer in anyway. Jumping the last few feet he rolled forward as he impacted the ground, his shoes making a soft thapping sound as he finished his dive; Dusting himself off he turned to Janos

"You said we have wonderful accommodation, the works! Your exact wording." Huffing, he began to untie one side of the trailers cover. Meanwhile, Jacob stood with his head cocked to one side, body poised to climb down the mech looking back at Atun he wondered where he learn't to move as fluidly as that. Mindful of his much greater size, and most likely much lesser acrobatic talent Jacob slowly climbed down the treacherous mountain of metal before beginning to assist Atun with the trailer.

"Yer, you beena tellin us dat we be getingda full fiave star accommodations." he remarked casually, lifting out the first of the tent frames.

"Indeed, I did and I didn't lie, For Quicksell this is the works!" Janos laughed as he began to leave the storage room "I can tell you've never worked for em before, anyhow im off to chat with the chief of this place"

Atun sighed and continued to lift various supplies and equipment from the trailer, looking over he saw Jacob staring at him.

"What?"

"Ur Boss man, Ee been workin for quicksell?" The first of the tent frames slid into place with a large thunk

"I suppose so, I never really asked but it would explain where he got his technical skills from.." Atun mused, giving the cover a swift kick to remove the dirt. Working togethor they managed to hoist the grey coloured tarp over the frame, patting each other on the back and lower arm respectively, the mismatched pair proceeded to remove the sixty or so tonnes of supplies strapped to the Urbanmechs.

"Soo, If you dont mind me asking, why did you get discharged" Atun broached cautiously as he rolled out the bed mats in the tent.

"Ah no mind, I was garrisin my home planet with mah lance for da locaal planetary militia, when some of dem slavers from the federation be comin, Mah lance failed to pertect de guvenor's daughter, I was discharged as a result." Jacob lent back onto the longest of the unfurled rolls, yawning slightly he turned to face the much smaller man, "Where you be gettin em moves?"

Atun twiddled his thumbs and had the decency to look modest, responded quietly

"Oh here and there, no place special." flopping down onto the smallest of the bed rolls they both waited in silence for Janos to return.

One of the side doors to the storage room slide open, bright light splayed out into the dark cavernous room as Janos stepped in, navigating around the piles of junk he plonked himself down besides Jacob and warmed his hands up next to the fire.

"Good news and bad news folks." Atun couldn't quite place the look on his face, but he knew it was one he hadn't seen before, which meant it wasn't good.

"Err, What?" he mumbled passing a cup of warm coffee to Janos "Bad news?"

Janos waved him off and grabbed the coffee with both hands.

"Aaaah, good old traditional insta-caff. Anyhow, As I was saying" pausing only to take a big sip, he continued "Good news, We'll get a seven day warning if anything hostile jumps into the system, also we'll be getting a little added bonus, mainly because were going to be hooking up one of the Urbie's fusion plants to smelter number four and six in order to jump start em." Janos's trusty big grin had returned by the end of his statement, waving his arms in the general direction of the large boxy vehicle.

"Dat hunk o junk mun? You musta been crazy!" Jacobs voice echoed around the room, his deep bass tones reverberating outwards unlike Janos and Atuns more passive tones.

"Thats not a piece of junk my good man," Janos stood up and began to gesture wildly to emphasis his points "That my good man is a study fourty tonne frame capable of moving up to sixty four kilometers per hour and mounting a cannon big enough to tear a hole in assault mechs, that my dear compadre is a Hetzer, Small low profile and its ICE engine minimize battlefield detection, its large boxy frame lending easily to modification and repair, Mercenaries dream right there!" Finishing with a flourish he plonked himself back down.

"You sir are a madman, A bonafide, certified, ludicrously underpaid madman." Atun deadpanned. "Are you kidding us?" He continued " Hetzers are a tomb, a moving box of death for its occupants!" he proceeded to recount numerous stories of Hetzers and their demise Atun hoped Janos would get the point, "they dont even come with radio's and decent targeting equipment fer the dragons sake."

Janos just smiled and patted Atun on the head,

"Calm down lad, those hetzers were driven by idiots who couldn't handle a vehicle even if it came with a comprehensive users manual, plus those hetzers were built by standard Quicksell employees, you havnt seen one built by me yet." looking back at the wreck he sighed, "Shes not much at the moment, the frames there, so's the wheels and suspension but that's about it."ticking off his fingers he listed off what they needed "Basically, I'll place an order at the machinist shop in town and they can send us over a engine for the thing, not one of the stock standard Hetzer engines mind you, hunks of junk" standing up and moving towards the Hetzer he brought a small lamp with him "The usual Hetzer engine is woefully inefficient, due to Quicksells cheapness its larger then normal owing to the lower quality materials used in addition to having shit poor battery life." Giving the rear section a swift kick "Its 'frame' is basically welded armor plates, shaving off some rear plating and shifting the engine back in addition to replace it with a more efficient one solves the space and battery issue."

Moving to the front he put his hand inside the massive hole that was were the Autocannon usually layed, "With such a roomy bay for the Autocannon, we could simply put in any ballistic or missile weaponry we could think of, we can steal buy or salvage some command and control systems, and a targeting array course we'd have to re-do all the electrical's and re-wire the thing but it could work." By this point Janos had stepped into the inside of the hull pointing and gesturing to where everything we could go.

While Atun stared at the Hetzer, lost in his own little world dreaming of super tanks roaming about killing all his enemies, Jacob was more alert and looked Janos in the eye.

"And whats the bad news?" the seriousness of his voice and the lack of accent coming through caused Atun to stop and listen.

"You know how I Said we would have seven days warning?" he queried, stepping out of the husk and back towards the small fire "Well, two days before we touched down they detected a small number of pirate unions and seekers burning in towards the planet."

Atun was no means a excellent mathematician, but he was still capable of basic maths.

**"HEY!"** He shouted, poking Janos in the chest. "That leaves us with three days."

"Yup, so get some rest we got work to do." Janos chuckled sadly, well aware they may or may not have three days to live, climbing into his bed roll, the world faded to black and a loud snoring noise could be heard.

Looking to break the ice, and distract the rapidly panicking Atun, Jacob mentioned they only thing he could think of

"Ya know mun, ur boss seems to be quite knowledgeable about dat dem quicksell products."

"You dont say?" Was Atuns only response before he dejectedly crawled into his own bedroll, sobbing once or twice he too fell into the warm embrace of sleep.

* * *

Review Responses: Any problems with lack of details, or not enough specifics on some things please tell me so i can fix it :D

Nui: I love em for several reasons, my GM played a really serious way of battle-tech with many home rules, Modifying mechs included a lot more "Does the mech's arm LOOK like a AC/20 would fit?" rather then.. Hey.. Critical slots, among other things.. so boxy looking / easy to repair fluff mechs were my fav. Your comment made my day! The fact people are reading this surprised me, i was half expecting to be flamed off the site due to my terribleness.

Bailomega: Thanks! That means alot to me, as I've stated before English is a second language, so my grammars all to hell.. but, i'm surprised people read and like it so i'm doing something right :P I've also been reading fanfics on here for like 5 years, im a TV Troper..

Ulquiorra9000: Thanks for the advice and things to add, will work on that. :D

RougeBaron: The first game i ever played i rolled up a lance of Urbies. I've loved em ever since, How could anyone not? So cute. And quite deadly for a lil thirty tonner even in stock standard.


	5. It starts

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I dont own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and a unamused colony of spiders.

Hah, you lot probably thought I'd died. But actually it was exams and or various real life complications, but hey. Im sorry, so heres an update.

* * *

It was a sweet revenge, planed with great care and with the utmost secrecy. The trap had been set, now it was time for the prey to spring it. Atun sat patiently on his bedroll watching the snoozing form of his boss, the alarm near his head ticking off the seconds until it was time to be awake. Shifting himself for a minute Atun looked outside, seeing only darkness and stars he yawned, wondering just how long the night cycles on this planet were. Unknownst to him, a certain liaison officer in a certain dropship on a certain part of the planet had looked up that information and had re-adjusted the alarms to suit it and enjoying a well earned lie in.

Atun tensed his body, his legs poised to spring into action, eagerly watching the alarm as the few remaining seconds of blissful slumber ticked away. Just before the last second would of been counted off, and the loud annoying siren rung. A hand snaked out from under the blanket, and Janos yawned. His face dropping and a surprised look on his face Atun began to roll up his bedroll mindful of the various critters he heard during the night and their probably desire to befoul it.

"Wakey Wakey!" He cried, decided to take some pleasure from waking up Jacob. Instead, a single eye opened, barely visible through his tangled mass of hair, Jacob studied Atun for a moment, before responding in his usual tone of voice

"You be havin wey to much enargy mun." Stretching and worming his way out of his bedroll, he quickly added to the statement "Wey to much" as Atun already began heading off towards the food supplies at a brisk pace, whistling loudly to himself. The cavernous bay was soon filled with the smell of frying bacon and other assorted meats as the trio sat down for breakfast. Jacob was the first to dare to start a conversation.

"So, what are we be doin today." stifling a yawn mid sentence, he resumed munching on his breakfast, relishing the satisfying crunch of the bacon.

"Not much, firstly we; that being you and me Jacob are going to restart the two fusion powered furnaces as we're the only things with a fusion engine in the area."

"I'm almost afraid to ask, what about me?" Atun managed to say through a mouth full of food, swallowing loudly and not just from a desire to eat the food, he eyed Janos up.

"Oh, not much your heading into town and picking up some supplies and parts."

"Parts?" Atun leaned forward interested, anything that could possibly make his little urbie more deadly was good "What kind?" he elaborated.

"Oh, electronics, wiring, this and that what ever you can from the local scrapyard that we can use to patch up the tank."

Atuns interest quickly vanished retorting sarcastically "That? A tank? Its a glorified deathbox."

"We pilot trashcans mun, we can do no talkin." Jacob chimed in hoping to end the impending fight before it started. Atun merely huffed in response and dusted himself off before jumping up in a display of athletic ability and heading to his Urbanmech, the various slings supporting equipment empty but ready to be re-purposed.

"I suppose I should just bill it to our account?" Atun remarked offhandedly as he patted his wallet, climbing up the side of his mech.

"Yup." Was the only response he got from Janos, except for the small payment chit which found itself flung into the open canopy of the Urbanmech. Buckling himself in, Atun ran some startup checks as Janos's voice came over the communications unit. "Eh, while your at it go hit up the local derby see if there are any wannabes who would like to pilot this forty tonne box of doom."

Atun's response was to mutter "Damn straight its a box of doom." under his breath as he powered up his mech, soon thumping feet could be heard as Atun piloted his mech out the storage bay and out onto the main path into the facility. Swerving around various bits of smaller machinery which he could probably break if he stepped on and moving out of the way of the large trucks which could probably break him if he tried to step on them Atun slowly stomped his way out to the main gates, the floor shaking and the ground rumbling wherever he strode men hung there heads out of the window and gazed upon his engine of destruction. Then they chuckled and went back to work, after all it was just a trashcan. Fuming at the lack of awe and jealousy emanating from the works Atun throttled his mech up to maximum speed and vaulted the security gate with his jumpjets, all the while wishing maybe he cause the old security guard a heart attack with the sudden noise and plum of fire. All being said, Atun lent back into his seat and put on some traveling music, after all it was two hours to the nearest town and back.

Having waited until Atun had left the facility, Jacob and Janos both agreed to return to bed and wait another two hours before commencing any activities that could possibly be defined as 'work' it was not untill sunrise, which was strangely enough roughly three hours later that Janos and Jacob both re-emerged from their slumber. Janos packed Jacob off into his Urbanmech and sent him off to meet with a dozen Quickcell technicians keen to start up the facilities fusion plants, the company unwilling to pay for fusion equipped mechs or vehicles to spend a few hours starting up the massive reactors. With Atun off running errands, Jacob assist Quickcell employees Janos rubbed his hands in barely restrained glee and retrieved a number of tools from one of the container pods.

Sheets of armor and coils of electrical wiring piled up on the floor next to the chassis of the Hetzer, soon joined by a large backpack connected welding and cutting device, hydraulic clamps and other tools of the trade. Loving making sure it was all in working equipment, Janos donned the large harness and slid himself into the backpack a few tentative button presses later and a roaring spike of fire erupted from the muzzle of the handheld section. Letting out a somewhat mad, and mostly insane bout of laughter Janos quickly set to work shearing off the remnants of the old armor plating in addition to removing with extreme prejudice all the original equipment.

By the time Janos had finished rendering down the jukn pile into a useable frame the entire bay smelt of burnt metal and the crackling of cooling rivers of melted components, the rivers of molten components were also joined by pools of Janos's sweat. shedding the cutting torch and its harness Janos let it slide to the ground with a thunk before walking over to a refrigerated container hooked up to a power outlet, opening the large door Janos stepped inside and shut it behind him, letting the room cool and the smoke and number to disperse while he relaxed in a nice cold location. Janos emerged from his cold break when he heard, well more accurately felt the return of either Atun or Jacob. Stepping outside the refrigerated container, he turned to the main doors to see Jacob's urbanmech stroll in, waving him in Janos headed back towards the Hetzer.

"How did it go Jacob?" Janos asked, the moment Jacob had finished extracted himself from the mech and climbing down slowly.

"Well enuf mun, the generata's have bin started." stretching out his massive frame, Jacob at the same time liberated a beer from the open container before shutting it behind Janos "Easy work mun, just had to be sittin dere and watch my heat levels."

"heat levels? what for?" Janos asked from behind a stack of wires, as he began threading them one by one through the frame installing what bits of equipment he had that he could.

"Those furnaces mun, the safety gratins on dem be mighty thin." gesturing to the sweat patches on his t-shirt he continued "bloody ting almost shut down me mech from the heat, and i be sitting there idlin."

"If nothing broken, then stop complaining then." Janos shrugged the wires that would hopefully connect the engine to the electrical systems had been installed in addition to seating but for the most part, Janos just hoped Atun would return with the parts, and he hoped he had enough cash. Moving over to his scorpion, Janos hopped on the radio and attempted to contact Kemps.

"Kemps? You there! Oi You." forgetting all forms of radio codes Janos kept talking into the comms waiting for Kemps to respond.

"Yes Jacob, I am here what is it." Kemps tone was flat and unamused, having been awoken from her beauty sleep she was not happy, even though she had managed to sleep almost the whole day by this point.

"Can you fly a dropship?" he inquired, idlly toying with the targeting system, the large missile rack mounted on top of his tank swiveling around tracking his imaginary target.

"Err probably. Why?" Now Kemps was just confused, brushing back wisps of her platinum hair back into a tight bun "You leaving?" she phrased her lasting question in a tone of voice that seemed to imply it would be a bad idea.

"Nope, your coming over here in the Rusty Nail."

"Why?" The confusion still lingered in her voice, if the mercenaries weren't going anywhere and they had plenty supplies... Why then did they have to make her do work! On the verge of giving Janos a piece of her mind for trying to squeeze free labor from her when she was quickly cutoff

"Just fly it over here, we might need the firepower."

Muttering unlady like profanities under her breath she shut off the comms and went to go contact the port docking authorities, most non-military flights having been grounded until the threat would be passed, bullying her way through red tape and threatening to have all the local port workers contracts invalidated by Quickcell she managed to get permission to lift off and head to Janos and the others.

It was midday by the time Atun returned, stomping his way through to the main gate unlike last time where he vaulted over it, he proceeded to go through the formalities the reason being a large trailer being dragged behind his mech full of various parts and pieces of equipment. Atun looked around as his radar reported a massive new contact, only to spot the familiar silhouette of the Rusty Nail come into view, the squat frame of the union class dropship making its descent onto one of the much smaller landing pads brought much joy to his heart. Mainly because Quickcell workers fled from the fiery plums of exhaust it emitted on its way down.

Bringing his mech to a stop in the storage area Atun popped the cockpit seals and gracefully scurried down the side of his mech, leaving Jacob again, wondering how Atun managed to do that or if he was part spider.

"Hey, you two" He yelled grabbing the attention of both Jacob and Janos "You going to help me unload the Urbanmech?" pointing behind him to the trailer that he had been dragging behind the mech. Trailer was a misnomer, it was a sheet of iron jury rigged with wheels and attached to the Urbanmech with string and hope.

"No, of course not." Janos replied, rubbing his hands in glee as he advanced upon the trailer, "What did you manage to get and how much did it set us back?" he enquired poking what obviously was a fairly large cannon.

"Consider our Quickcell is now our only monies." pulling out a small manifesto sheet, he began ticking off items "Mydron A heavy self loading autocannon from a variant Urbanmech, GM 140 Gas turbine turbo engine, radio system, target computer from a salvaged hunchback, battery and redundant electrical system, tires, hubcabs, headlights, control circuitry and so on and so forth." slapping the list into Janos's hand Atun went to go and lie down for a bit, content to rest after spending most of the day in his mech.

"Nice haul, How did you get the Myrdron?" Janos remarked, examining the condition of the parts, which were in good condition.

"Junkyard owners son is a big mech fanatic, he was trying to assemble a small mech for his son, he thought i was gonna sell my Urbie the look on his face when I said no, Anyhow I did him a deal he would gather all the parts load em onto a truck or trailer while I conducted the rest of our business and his son could ride in the Urbie with me." Atun replied, a hint of pride creeping into his voice "His sons pleading voice and look was the deciding factor in him selling us the Myrdron at a low low price."

"Excellent, go have a rest for half and hour or so and then I want you to go and check on Kemps, she should be here by now in the Rusty Nail." some of the smaller pieces of equipment already in hand Janos began unloading things to make room for the small lift hoist to pick up the heavy autocannon.

For the majority of the thirty six hour day that still was ahead of them, Janos and Jacob continued to work on the Hetzer, installing various pieces of equipment. Atun soon joined them having checked that Kemps was alive, and well. Still irritated that she was woken up and had to do work for no reason, but alive and well.

* * *

Amity II, Amity System; Quickcell Ore Refinery March 3rd

"Allright, Men, Atun, Ladies." Janos began, puffing himself up to look self important standing atop the boxy frame of the Hetzer "Today is the day we do or die, simply put folks, those raiders, house troops or pirates or even god himself is about to rain down fury from the sky and see to it that we do not exist."

Atun looked at Jacob and rolled his eyes, while Kemps stood idly by wondering where this was going

"The fair local folk at the port authority have sent us the approximate area where these folks will be landing, a Union with thrust ratio's indicating a full load is going to drop near us, its not bearing any markings so its most likely hired help or pirates. However, its much larger brother the overlord is landing due east of the capital so we need to be prepared in case reinforcements come from that area, unlike the Union the Overlord is bearing the markings of the Lyran Armed Forces both will land within the half hour"

Atun cocked his head and looked at Jacob, "A full house battalion? we sure as hell aint equipped for that kind of action and i thought you said there was only one dropship!"

"The Union was hiding behind the profile of the Overlord and lets hope it dosn't come to that, untill then keep preparing and getting ready, were loading the Hetzer into the dropship. Its ready but we dont have a pilot, Kemps has volunteered to run mission control for us which frees me to provide fire support from the Scorpion."

Jacob turned to look at Kemps before back to Jacob "And um, boss what we be havin in de wey of intel?"

Janos didn't respond, rather he pointed towards Kemp who needed her head and then answered for him "We have a few quickcell employees out in the field in scoutcars, they will report back to us the approximate size and number of hostiles that we should expect to engage."

"Oh joy, Quickcell intelligence a misnomer if I ever heard one." Atun drawled, climbing up into his mech with Jacob following suit soon after and climbing into his.

"Now, remember do NOT go out through the main gates, or anywhere near there. We dumped about five hundred tonnes of metal and scrap across the field except along the main road. Mechs have no trouble going through the field, so that's okay but the main road has about ten tonnes of explosive lined along it, donated by the miners to prevent fast movers getting through, and most importantly; good luck." The noise of the scorpion starting its own fusion engine was soon muffled by the closing canopies of the mechs, and then drowned up by the start up of their much larger fusion power plants.

"Comm check, this is Atun reporting in, all systems are good."

"Comm check, dis be Jacob reportin in, systems green"

"Comm check, Janos here and ready to roll."

"Rusty Nail to all units, I read you loud and clear good luck and try not to die, Quickcell hired you for six months, don't go dying in the first week."

The two Urbanmechs led the way out of the storage area heading towards the front of the refinery, taking up flanking positions the duo parked their mechs either side of the main gates hiding behind two large piles of iron. Janos however, drove the scorpion around the facility and onto the second level before parking behind several barricades of junk radioing in there positions they began to sit and wait.

Forty minutes later the first of the Quickcell field agents radioed in.

"Rabbit One to Budget Warriors we got six hover's en route, I count two APC's and four Harrasers, Rabbit out."

Janos swore, the dust plume of the hovercraft already visible in the distance

"This is Janos to all units, get ready. Thanks Rabbit one." Janos slammed the hatch back down and buttoned himself in, activating his targeting system he sighted the road segment and kept watch, finger on the remote detonate ready praying to himself that mining charges would get the job done.

The distinct sleek frame of the lead four hovercraft were soon visible on the horizon along with the blocky twin six rack of short range missiles sitting in turret mounts of each one. Janos shook with excitement, fear and nervous energe was they neared the main gates, only to stop and let the infantry dismount from the trailing APC's.

"Boss mun, we got a problim." Jacobs voice echoed in the scorpions control compartment slapping the reply button Janos hurridly responded

"Aye I see em, maintain radio silence I'll tell you went to break cover, wait for my signal." Flipping the switch on the top of the targeting stick Janos watched the missile system arm itself, the hatches popped open on twenty missile tubes and the rack angled to the horizon ready to unleash its payload. Plotting the trajectory and lining up the target Jacob really wished he had more practise with this thing as he triggered his first flight of missiles.

Jacob and Atun tracked the arching flight of missiles from thier hidden ambush points for as long as they could, before their cover impeeded there vision, they waited one.. two.. three seconds before Janos's voice crackled over the comms

"AHAHA Toasted the ground pounders!" Janos smirked and patted the dashboard of his scorpion happily as they next flight of missiles loaded into tubes mindful that he only had about elven salvos left, but pleased with his first efforts. Where the first wave of infantry stood, only charred leggings and dismebered body parts laid, the flight of missiles had plastered the area with explosions tearing the exposed infantry to shreds. The remaining infatry piled back into the APC's, no more then five or six soldiers.

Dust flared up again as the four lead scout craft shot off again, barreling down the main road towards the facility able to clear it in less than two or three seconds, Janos almost missing the oppertunity as he scrambled to pick up the detonator triggering them moments later.

The roadway flared to life as ten tonnes of mining grade blast charges turned cement and dirt into pits and smoking craters, the two trailing Harrassers had been in the middle of the detonation, the flaming wrecks of them were visible as they spun through the area crashing into the ground somewhere amongst the pile of rubble and metal.

"GO GO GO" Janos was almost shouting into the comms when he radioed Jacob and Atun to spring the trap, preying the duo could bullsye those targets.

The two harassers shaken from the massive explosive behind them had slowed down in order to make sure they were okay, in that briefest moment when they had their guard down two identical Urbanmechs except for a small colored marking on the feet pads stepped out from behind two piles of rubble, salvos of short range missiles streaked out in panic, and blew apart innocent mounds of metal.

Janos and Atun on the other hand took a few extra seconds to aim, and it showed as both picked different targets, two streaks of lightening shot forth from their particle projection cannons, Jacob's shot was dead on, impacting the center of the Harassers chassis causing it to crash into the ground as it roasted the pilots alive and much of the internal systems.

Atun was not so lucky, his shot going wide and impacting the ground thirty feet in front of the speeding hovercraft, unlike his target however he had no need to reload and simply switched to his secondary weapons system, a trio of ruby red lasers streaked out from his left arm pod and cut deep gouges into the front armour of the craft, penetrating it and causing it too to crash skid like its comrade. Turning to look to the main gates, Atun saw the two APC's hurriedly make a withdrawal, putting themselves out of range of any weaponry that could be mustered agaisnt them short of artillery.

"Janos, this is Atun any more hostiles?"Atun panted as he breathed in cool air the heat levels in his mech dropping rapidly as he ceased all motion

"Negative, find a new hiding spot those cowards are going to go tell mommy." Janos chuckled, swiping his brow noting that those two harrasers had they hit, could of caused significant damage. Quickly planning to take advantage of the peace, Janos opened a channel to Kemps

"Janos to Rusty Nail, have some tow trucks drag in those hovercraft for salvage before the reinforcements arrive, speaking of which.. wheres the rest of the enemy?" Janos turned his veiw to the horizon once again, looking around for any signs of incoming enemy.

"Rusty Nail to Janos, will do some employees are already heading out." Kemps responded, equally relieved that noone had died. yet.

"Rabbit two to Budget Warriors, Rabbit ones down and we got two lances of enemy mechs incoming. They packed that Union full, probably why we haven't seen any air support, Rabbits are bugging out."

"Atun to Rabbit two, what we got incoming?" Atun nervously asked, his Urbanmech already retreating into the factory Jacob right behind him.

"Err, looks like.. Two locusts" The scout began, the sound of his engine lowering as he slowed his retreat to get a better look at the enemy "there appears to be two wasps, or stingers.. make that four either way.."

Static covered the last half of the transmission before the scout could be made out again "Two commandos following behind clearing the way for, a centurion I think, and maybe an Assassin."

Atun was very glad that his radio response was covered by static as his reaction to the news was less than pleasant and very vocal, parking his mech and staring off into the distance he began to wait.


	6. Is this how it ends?

Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I dont own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and a unamused colony of spiders.

My chapters are slowly getting larger, and I am getting closer to my goal of 5,000-10,000 Words a chapter. I have no idea how some people make extremely long and epic chapters, I'm struggling to write out 5,000.

* * *

Grubby hands grabbed at controls and mashed down on buttons, electrical signals rushed down through wires and control units, myomer bundles coiling in response the skeletal frames they were wrapped around moving at there direction. While all this delicate work, and advanced technology worked on the inside, much more appeared to happen on the outside as thin legs moved back and forward in rapid succession moving the large steel cage that was the bulk of its mass forward at incredibly fast speeds.

"Get out the way michaels, its coming towards us!" screamed a man, sprinting after another through the soft vegetation that covered most of the plains between the Quickcell refinery and the domed shape of the Union, barely visible fifteen miles to the west. The 'it' in question that was chasing the two men was a reverse joined skinny limbed mech. Each long stride catapulted the spindly legged mech closer and closer to the two fleeing men, soon a second mech join the first launching itself across the ground it came to a stop, one leg perched on the flaming wreckage of a small scout cat the other leg on the ground.

The two arm pods on the second mech swiveled and pointed skywards missiles visibly loaded in its launchers as it waited for a target to present itself, its twin brother zigging and zagging through the fields briefly accompanied by the short sharp barks of automatic fire from its two stubby arms. Suddenly the first stopped, standing up tp its full almost two story height, it scanned the horizon for a second, the 'head' of the mech turned and faced its almost identical brother perched on the wreckage.

"Did we lose em Jimmy?" one of the men, Micheal managed to say between ragged breaths, diving to the floor and hiding in the loose grass.

"I think so, lets stay here for now." the other replied grabbing his canteen he proceeded to take a swig of water before the thudding of feet and the shaking ground stopped him. A dark looming shadow covered the ground around him, looking up the duo stared into the face of death. A Billowing gout of flame soon erupted from the large tbue hanging on the underside of the mech. The gouts of fire and flame stuck to the ground and the things in the area, the cries of pain died in the throats of Micheals and Jimmy, there bodies roasted to a crisp before they could scream. The Locust mech stood triumpantly in the small patch of blackened earth, scuff marks, worn armor segments and a greying paint scheme may have adorned its small frame, but the twenty tonne engine of destruction stood proud over the corpses of its enemies, regardless of how out-shadowed it was by its larger contemporaries.

_"Two scouts down, This is Ravager one to command, we are moving towards the next scout group reported by advance teams."_ A radio transmission quickly filtered from the forward locust to the Centurion at the base of the dropship.

_"Command to all Ravager units, proceed and wipe out the defending forces, we were promised all we could loot, So make it count boyo's."_

The locusts ran forward at full sprint to the next reported location, the others moving up to the area now cleared of hostile scouts. The faint markings of a mercenary group painted shakily onto the torso of the Centurion visible as it passed by the would-be scouts, not that it mattered the markings were of a small merc band, one of many untold thousands operating in the inner sphere this only only notable because of its capture by the Lyran Commonwealth and subsequent draft into the Lyran Military after a failed Marik sponsored raid.

* * *

Atun wrang his hands in frustration, if possible he would of preferred to pace himself or his mech back and forth across the compound, but that would give away his position to the enemy scouts sitting just outside of range of the missile systems carried by the Scorpion. Sitting atop the APC's the remaining enemy infantry was content to lounge atop their vehicles and make crude and rude gestures to the defenders they knew were watching. The enemy had a measure of the Budget Warrior's strength, but most importantly they could afford to sit and wait for reinforcements to arrive and help crush the two mechs guarding the facility.

Thankful for only one small mercy, the cockpit of his mech was wide open and fresh air was allowed to circulate, this was mainly due to radio silence needing to be maintained. The problem of a lack of contact was solved by Quickcell employees placed within yelling distance of each other relaying commands and simple information.

The loud voice of the refinery worker sitting behind a wall above his mech broke Atun from his constant fuming with a short cry of

"Wake up you mercenary, your boss says the reinforcements are here."

"Oh Joy." Was all Atun could think to respond with, closing the cockpit canopy with a hiss, he noted the Quickcell employee had picked up his rifle and begun running deeper into the facility, Atun snorted.

_"Cowards"_ He thought to himself, blissfully unaware of the irony as he recited his unlock codes, his fusion engine thrummed to full output for a second, before settling back down into its idle state, testing out his range of movement, Atun was pleased to note nothing broken during the few hours he had sat their waiting.

Unlike Atun who was located in a open position to rain down fire upon the enemy, Jacob has positioned himself in the main smelting room which contained the only pathway to both the Quickcell head office and the dropship bay. Shaken from his casual nap like Atun by the shout of another Quickcell employee, Jacob quickly slammed shut his own canopy and started up his mech before doing his own system checks to make sure everything was green. Assuming the ready position, Jacob carefully walked the Urbanmech behind one of the large refinery furnaces, unlike the two he had jump started during the week the one he was hiding behind had sufficient heat shielding as to not roast his mech and send it into a catastrophic shutdown.

Likewise, Atun had parked his mech in a crouched position behind a series of large vertical supports, overlooking the roadway into the facility from the main gate Atun had an excellent field of fire while remaining sufficiently protected by the reinforced concrete supports that held the rest of the facility above him.

With the two Urbanmechs in deep cover, and both in positions in which they could use there jump jets to flee Janos had decided to relocate himself having reloaded his long range missile magazines, he carefully maneuvered his tank to the opposite side of the facility on the second floor, his new position afforded him the same view as his previous one, but was infinitely less exposed to jump capable mech and any aircraft or VTOL's the enemy force might have at its disposal.

Wishing he still had the internal combustion engine in the Scorpion instead of the fusion engine he had mounted in there, the lack of a massive infrared signature would of been really nice, instead he stuck out on sensors as a massive heat blip, like most mechs. Which carried a bonus in this situation, as the enemy thought that an archer or other missile carrying mech had taken up residency inside the facility along with the two Urbanmechs. Angling his turret to the horizon, Janos popped open the hatch and retrieved his binoculars.

"Aww damn." His mouth suddenly felt very dry, two locusts were sprinting towards the facility at almost maximum speed closely followed behind by two stingers, or wasps. Grabbing his radio, he attempted to contact the Quickcell scouts the fact there was no response was a bad sign, the fact there was no advance warning that the enemy was very close was an even worse sign. Buttoning his tank back up, Janos sent the prearranged signal through the radio to Jacob and Atun, a simple 'ping' noise that lasted for barely a second, warning the two that enemy reinforcements were here.

It was nearly the middle of the day when the invading mercenaries began to make their move, while the battle for the refinery had just began fighting around the planets capital had been going on since the moment the Lyrans had landed, news continually streamed in of assault and heavy Lyran mechs slowly tearing through the League defenders, slwoly being pushed back as they were out weighed and out gunned. Rather then weaken the resolve of the Budget Warriors, this news only emboldened Atun, Janos and Jacob to stand strong and repel the attacks.

Unlike the original scouting force which charged headlong into an ambush, the enemy battlemech pilots were much more intelligent, the wasp and stinger both advanced towards the facility on opposite sides of the road, running through iron piles before vaulting over them with their jumpjets. The two locusts began to dash along the central road at half speed the APC advancing ahead of them on the lookout for any explosives or traps that would endanger the expensive mech.

All this maneuvering and skirting about was presided over by two Commandos which began to slowly trod through the iron strewn surroundings towards the facility, the presumably much more experienced, or higher ranked mercenaries piloting the two commando's content to let the smaller mechs do the advance recon. These light mechs were not the cause of the fear prevailing in Janos's body, but rather the two mechs that simply stood at the main gates and watched. His town Urbanmechs outweighed half of the enemy light mechs combined, but the Centurion standing by, Auto-cannon primed and presumably loaded was a cause for concern. The so called 'Assassin' the Quickcell scouts had reported in turned out to be something much worse, a Javelin, which was a mech that carried enough firepower to seriously wreck the armored forms of the two Urbanmechs.

The APC passed by distinctly shaped pile of iron slag, Janos had one hand primed on the firing stud for his missile systems having locked in the left hand stinger which was the closest mech his other hand primed on the communications system ready to give the open fire order. Together, Janos and Atun had marked out ranges at intervals of sixty meters by moving the piles of slag into distinct shapes, once locusts passed the star shaped iron slag roughly three hundred metres away he could give the order to fire.

Time seemed to slow down as the Locusts crossed the imaginary line that lay between the fields of peace and battle. With one final step, the spindly legged mech stepped into a viable targeting range.

Mashing down on both the firing studs for his missile systems and the communications system Janos screamed _**"FIRE FIRE FIRE!" **_Rockets simultaneously echoed his war cry, as they shrieked through the sky towards his foe.

The Stinger pilot's missile lock alarm blared its warnings, and he engaged his jumpjets rocketing out the way just before the majority of the missiles hit home, the trail end of the salvo almost half a dozen missiles cratered and scarred his right side, rocking the small mech as it sailed through the air. Its medium laser fired impotently in response, the scarlet beam etching yet another jagged line into the facilities cement walls.

Atuns response was much more impressive then the flight of missiles, bringing his Urbanmech out of its crouch, the domed head and stubby arms swung around and pointed directly down into the path of the incoming enemy mechs and vehicles. Selecting all of his weaponry he mashed down on his firing studs in rapid succession, a wave of heat flooding the cockpit as yet another streak of man made lightening arced out from the Urbanmechs right weapon pod, his aim true the streak crossed the distance between him and the enemy in less than a second slamming into the center of the APC it immediately crashed into the ground a flame, its occupants charred husks.

His secondary weapons systems had fired during the flight time of the particle bolt, a trio of red lasers streaked from his left arm pod and marred the previously unblemished, yet worn armor of the lead Locust, the other having slowed its gait to a crawl.

Atun barely had time to wonder why it stopped to present a target before two swarms of missiles lept from its arm pods and streaked towards him and his cover, bringing his mech back down into a crouch, Atun held onto the controls for his life as the world around him exploded into chips and fragments of cement, Righting himself he spun his mech around and began backing down the corridor towards the dropship hangar, the lead locust eagerly sprinting up the one of the side ramps, chasing after him, the second; longer ranged Locust however began to run into the facility, heading towards the smelting rooms and the path to the hangar bay that lay through it, the two commando's not far behind.

**_"Jacob! You got incomming!"_** Atun screamed into his radio, furiously trying to keep the Urbanmech upright as he sprinting backwards in unfamilar terrain, barely registering the massive Whoosh that accompanied Janos's second flight of missiles.

Janos whooped for joy and pumped his fist, his second salvo had rang true. The second flight of twenty missiles had caught the Stinger mid jump, the repeated explosions enough to send the light mech careening through the area and skidding to a stop admist the junk piles, immobile.

His victory cry however, was cut short as the second light mech, now recognizable as a Wasp changed tactics, making a direct beeline him it began to jump from pile to pile, gaining altitude in preparation to drop on the Scorpion, unafraid of the small Scorpion tank which previously was mistaken for the much larger, and much more intimidating Archer due to its fusion engine infrared signatur.

_"Janos bugging out, one mech down!" _he quickly reported, putting the Scorpion into reverse heading towards the depths of the facility, hoping that the tight confines could compensate for the Scorpions lack of close range weaponry, and that mass salvos of missiles would bring down the enemy wasp.

Both Atun and Jacob opened fire simultaneously, Jacob for the first time as he broke cover and ambushed the second Locust, his medium lasers all going wide as they carved trenches into the cement floor, however his particle projection cannon made up for it in abundance, scoring a direct hit to the right hand side of the mech, armor melted off in rivers and streams as its right leg simply snapped off due to the stress and firepower, the mech skidded forward on one side, futher damage marring its scorched right side. Components and wiring sprayed out of the gaping wounds instead of blood and the heat signature of the mech faded away as the pilot made the universal sign of surrender.

_"A light mech be down'd mun" _Jacob annouced, nonchalantly as under the watchful eye of his weaponry the pilot bailed from his mech and ran towards the armed and waiting quickcell employees.

The only response over the comms system was the sheer cry of unrestrained glee that came from Atun.

**_"Yeeeaaahhhh!" _**He cried, again firing all of his weapons causing his mech to come dangerously close to overheating. Slapping down the override button just in the nick of time, he was rewarded with the sight of his attacks hitting home, the center torso of the Locust simply ceasing to exist as a coherent whole. Instead a single large puncture wound was evidence of where the particle cannon had struck, while deep gouges in the now wrecked armor bore evidence of the medium lasers.

The Locust simply began to fall forward, its pilot in a last ditch attempt to damage the Urbanmech before it became combat inoperable was to triggered all of weapons on full auto as he the mech came screeching down, hundreds of rounds of high caliber machine gun ammunition rattled out from its arm pods while gouts of flame spurted from the centrally mounted flamethrower before coming to a stop mid fall, the automatic safeties kicking in.

Radioing in his own victory Atun slowly continued to back down the roadway heading towards the smelting facilities down one level instead of the hangar bays, intent on providing support to Jacob.

_"Anyone got visuals on targets?" _Atun asked the plodding gait of his mech gradually picking up speed as it became safer to push the fusion engines back to its limits.

_"Negativo."_ Janos reported in, his breath ragged as the heat dispersal systems present in the scorpion while effective, tended to still warm up the tank beyond what would usually be considered normal.

_"Ah mun, nobodeh her.. Scratch dat mun, **Two Commundos!**" _Jacobs relaxed tone shifted mid sentance, before rising to an alarmed cry the two commandos came around the corner and unsleashed there payload of deadly short ranged missiles.

Too intent on dodging the scores of missiles, Jacob did not initially return fire instead deciding to concentrate on keeping his mech upright as the first wave of missiles slammed into his mech, forcing it against the wall and almost onto its side.

_"Ah, 'ittel Atun mun Halp meh!"_ Jacob cried into the comms, weakly returning fire on the closest Commando, medium lasers carving great rents into its armored panels as his PPC bolt went wide, instead chosing to obliterate an innocent cement pillar.

Terror ran through Jacobs mind as no response came through the radio, unwilling to believe his lance mate had abandoned him he prayed that Atun would arrive soon.

_"Come on little man, where the hell are you?" _He thought to himself, heat levels spiking rapidly as he fired again in quick succession barely bothering to let his weapons cycle.

Spark's flew from the left side of his mech, before his battle computer began blaring warnings that one of his medium lasers was now non functional, this bad news was somewhat tempered by the PPC bolt sheering off the right arm of a Commando, the roasted components falling to the ground in a useless heap.

His mech rocking from all the explosive detonations occurring around him, Jacob began to say prayers for himself when his radar picked up the localized friend or foe tag of Atuns Urbanmech

The squat, domed mech descended down from the second levels to the first, cushioned by the plumes of exhaust coming from its jumpjets, the sight of the descending Urbanmech being the most beautiful thing in the world to Jacob at that moment, enough for him to forgive it for all its faults.

_"Better late then never!" _Atuns enthusiastic cry reverberated through Jacobs cockpit, the relatively undamaged Commander barring maintenance issues turned to face the new comer, its scuffle with the Locust clearly evident as its armor plates were cracked and dented in sections. However, it was almost completely ignored as Atun triggered his PPC, firing directly into the back of the damaged Commando, the lightly armored mech, already damaged simply crumpled to the ground as too much of its vital internal components were turned into melted metal.

Nimbly dodging the majority of the Commando's outgoing firepower Atun began to re-target the Commander when suddenly he lost control, the last few missiles knocking his mech backwards and into the ground behind him, struggling to right himself Atun watched helplessly as the Commando prepared to open fire again, only to breath a sigh in relief as Jacob had rejoined the fight.

Armor hung of his mech in pieces, and his left arm was more wire then armor but he had weaponry, and he had a duty.

Even with the massive damage sustained to his mechs torso's and arms, Jacob was capable of correctly aiming his weapons, the lighting bolt that streaked from his particle projection cannon hitting home into the side of the Commando, along with a single medium laser denting the mechs head.

The sudden attack from the 'downed' Urbanmech caught the Commando pilot off guard, it gave Atun just enough time to bring his Urbanmech to its feet and unload its own weapons fire into the Commando, unlike its twin this one died a violent death, with some un-used missile detonating inside, the pilot unable to override the safety systems and eject perished when a fireball erupted from the Commando's ammunition stores.

Atun shielded his eyes, and his mech visibly recoiled before he ambled his way over to Jacob.

_"Everyone okay? Wheres the rest of em!" _Atun asked, panting from fear, excitement and exhaustion.

_"Im okay mun" _Jacob responded, his mech already walking towards the next defensive point as the smoke from the burning Commando began to slowly attempt to fill the massive room.

_"So am I" _came Janos's response, the audible sound of his fusion engine rumbling in the background _"I lost the wasp chasing me, thank god."_ The relief was obvious in his voice, "_That just leaves the Centurion and the Javelin, you guys see where they went?"_

_"No, But I have a feeling we are going to find out soon."_ Atun responded, fear creeping into his voice, pushing his mech into a sprint he ran after Jacob, the reasoning being the much louder footsteps he heard coming from the opposite side of the smoke, the sound he assumed would belong to a large mech like the Centurion.

Atuns guess was correct, for barely seconds later the leading edge of the luxor autocannon was visible through the smoke screen, the bark of its fire and the stream of heavy rounds utterly demolishing the any and all cover that Atun took during his retreat, the darting form of a Javelin running out moments later and sprinting towards him, the only truely frightening thing was the amount of firepower the Centurion output as it slowly advanced upon him.

While it slowly marched forward at a constant pace, gaining on him bit by bit its constant stream of firepower was staggering, Walls, pillars and even the heavy shielding of the smelters took fire and began to crumble under the pressure as lines of autocannon fire crisscrossed the room, accompanied by streams of short range missile fire as the Javelin doged back and forth, easily avoiding the erratic and panicked return fire from Atun, Just as he almost making it around the corner, the Centurion finally got a lucky shot in, its Autocannon tearing a chunk out Atun's rear armor, causing sparks of electricity to arc out as it was breached.

The Urbanmech, with Atun in it flew forwards. Unable to keep it upright the mech ended up face down in the ground as it skidded to a halt, with Atun slamming his head into the control panel as his mech suddenly came to a stop. Unable to stave off the impending doom, and his certain death Atun watched as the Centurion and its sidekick advanced.

_**"LEAVE HIM ALONE AND PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE!"**_ was the rallying cry that shook Atun from his stupor, checking his visual sensors, Atun saw Janos visible from the outside of his Scorpion tank. Moments later he blended into the cloud of smoke that formed as his missile systems fired their deadly payloud.

The Javelin and Centurion looked as if they were able to dive out the wave, before they realized the entire flight of missiles went wide, Atun's face fell as his hope of surviving this ordeal was crushed, turning his mech slightly, he stared into the barrel of the Centurion as it prepared to fire upon his mech in revenge.

Atuns world faded to black in a wave of heat and light, he wondered if this was how it would end.

* * *

Ulquiorra9000- :P Crafty enough for ya? You dont want to know how many double sixes and double ones I rolled during this game (pretty much every battle in this story at some point was actually gamed out during my campaign.) I was tearing my hear out at every double one and cheering at every twelve. For Comparison, using Standard BT rules, Atun and Janos are both Greenies, with Jacob being the only regular


	7. Apparently, Its how it starts

_**Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder**_

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I dont own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and a unamused colony of spiders.

Woot, Breached 5,000 Words. Hopefully quality is keeping pace with quantity. Anyhow, keep reading and reviewing please it would sadden me greatly to have no reviews or readers. I kinda think things went to fast, but at the same time i'm not to sure how to make it slower..

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The sound of metal on metal rumbled through the wide hallways of the refinery as Janos drove the Scorpion tank onwards as fast as he could, coaxing every scrap of power from its fusion engine as he could. The louding repeated pinging noise of his missile detection system blaring in his ear as he tried to escape the light mech that pursued him.

_"Kemps, Get your sweet ass down into the cargo bay and drive the Hetzer out now!" _Janos's harsh tone brokered no backtalk, there was rapid movement before the radio went silent, Kemps presumably running down to the loading bay as quick as she could. Janos heard the pounding of padded shoes on metal before it faded away, nodding his head and letting out a grunt of satisfaction he resumed his attempts at life.

Yelping in surprise, Janos narrowly avoided a close encounter between his head and the Scorpions roof hatch, his efforts at avoiding bodily harmed earn him a second medium laser mark, he swore he could smell the melted and blasted armor. Tracks clacking with wild abandon Janos, with much effort managed to make the Scorpion drift around the corner, a feat which elicited a curious exclamation from the Wasp pilot.

"_What the fra..." _was the thought running through the head of the mech pilot, as his mech was running after the Scorpion. Each leaping stride brought it closer and closer to the fleeing tank. The pilots hands white as they gripped his control sticks, legs furiously working the pedals as he gleefully anticipated another kill.

Beads of sweat ran down Janos's face, the dropship bays were less than a hundred meters away. His alarm blared another warning at him, as another pair of missiles slammed into the back of his tank, accompanied by the warm feelings that medium laser impacts always gave him. Desperate for a few more seconds of cover, the turret on top of his tank swung around at his behest, a flight of missiles screaming down the massive tunnel section before blasting chunks from reinforced concrete walls.

It did however, serve its purpose, the Wasp pilot slowed his mech's gait, his sensors fluctuated for a minute before settling on the answer that No fusion engines were powered up in the bay. Which was a good sign, a powered up drop ship meant a dead Wasp.

Confident in his assured victory, he resumed his full forward speed and burst into the open bay, the massive frames of the Union and Mules docked there dwarfing his mech, but no matter. Once he Wasp had dealt with the tanks, the dropships were his for the taking.

"**Halt scorpion tank, this is Pilot Rancta of the Ravagers Mercenary Unit, you have fought the good fight stand down now and you will be spared."** Glee laced Rancta's voice. He glanced down at his communication console, making sure he was on loud speaker as the Scorpion slowed down and turned to face him.

There was more good news, his commanding officer had begun the pursuit of the two Urbanmechs that had caused so much trouble, but the capture of the Union was well worth the trade off in mechs.

Unlike Rancta who was counting his chickens before they hatched, Janos was smiling inside his tank for a completely different reason. The pilot, in his glee and joy at having captured the enemy and their dropships had neglected to look inside the open hangar bay door of the Union.

Popping open his hatch, and lazily leaning outside Janos calmly responded to the opposing mercenaries offer of surrender.

"Kiddo, you got a lot to learn." He chuckled, before putting emphasis on his next few words, he continued "**you** can be the one to surrender." Pointing towards the boxy shape sitting in the open hangar bay, Janos told him to look up.

The pilot looked up, and his smile quickly left his face. His head dropped moments later and slammed into his control panel, a curse on his lips. Hands darting over his engine controls he put his mech into a crouching position and powered down.

Popping the canopy, the young pilot slowly climbed out before sticking his hands into the air

"I surrender." He was no longer happy.

Janos was smiling, waving Kemps back into the dropship, he watched as several rifle carrying Quickcell employees carted off the mechwarrior. The moment the pilot had left the bay, Janos wiped the sweat from his brow, staring up he began to thank the gods that someone was looking out for him, the pilot hadn't seen though his ruse. The unfinished Hetzer posed as much threat as a cardboard cut out of an Atlas.

_"Everyone okay? Wheres the rest of em!" _Janos turned to look at his radio when he heard Atun's voice, quickly sliding back into his seat after surveying the damage done to his tank he responded, Jacobs voice fading away just moments before

"_So am I, I lost the wasp chasing me, thank god." _he stated, echoing Jacobs statement of health, glad that everyone was okay a brief thought flashed across Janos's mind. "_That just leaves the Centurion and the Javelin, You guys see where they went?"_

_"No, But I have a feeling we are going to find out soon."_ was the response he received, and it sent chills down his spine.

He was struck from his state of contemplation by the loud booming noise of a large autocannon, the rapid successions of explosions that followed were presumably the Javelin delivering its payload. Bringing his scorpion up to speed, Janos honestly hoped he was enough to turn the tide of the fight, considering his tank was ninety percent hope and ten percent armor at this point, his hopes weren't that high.

The Scorpion tank began to race across the half a kilometer long dropship bay, Janos never wished as hard in his life for a faster vehicle

_"My kingdom, my kingdom, my kingdom for a locust or ciccada." _in the remaining time before he arrived, he rescinded his a part of his wish, as he wouldn't of been able to do anything with the Ciccada when he arrived, while he had a fine appreciation for undervalued equipment, not even his own modest genius could fix the Ciccada. Drawing ever closer to the doors on the far side, the explosions and missile fire growing ever louder and nearer, Janos breathed a sigh of relief as Jacob's Urbanmech limped out and into the open room.

_"Status report Jacob!"_ he half shouted into the comms as he closed the final hundred meters to the large hallway.

_"Me mechs in a bad wey mun, But Atun be much more trouble" _the mangled arm that was barely attached to his mech a testament to his words, internal components and the dim glow of the fusion engine visible through the massive gaps in his armor. Gulping, and swallowing his own fear Janos screeched to a halt as he got a clear view of the situation.

An unblemished Centurion advanced upon the battered and fallen form of Atun's Urbanmech the boxy missile carrying form of a Javelin skidding to a halt besides it.

Looking left and right Janos saw no way to salvage the situation, the Centurion by now was standing over the Urbanmech, its bulky frame dwarfed by the sheer size of the smelters. His hands reaching for the radio to broadcast their surrender suddenly stopped, Janos's mouth fell open.

_'No.. it couldn't be..'_ He thought to himself, before deciding on the fates to risk it. His turret quickly spun around, a direct line between it setting a four second delay on the firing mechanism, Janos popped the hatch and stuck his upper body outside, believing himself finished.

Sucking in a deep breath, he winced as the warm air mixed with explosive fragments scorched his throat.

_**"LEAVE HIM ALONE AND PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE!"**_ he yelled as hard as he could, shaking his fist at the Centurion pilot. Dimly aware that the Urbanmechs head and turned a fraction to see him, Janos nodded and disappeared into a cloud of smoke and fire.

Zero point two seconds. Thats how long it takes for a volley of Doombud 20 Long range missiles to cross a thirty meter distance. Time seemed to slow, as Janos slid down back into the tanks compartment, the fight had only lasted for ten minutes. Not even that, and as the missiles crossed the gap between the Scorpion and the Centurion. A dry chuckled escaped his lips as he realized it came down to these next few seconds.

The two mechs moved to dodge out the way, myomer muscle strands straining to propel the massive machines in a sudden new direction, the effort was for nothing as the missiles streaked over head. Muscles relaxed in response as the threat passed, laughter exchanged between pilots. The booming laughter of a chorus of explosions soon joined in the fun, the rapid thud of twenty quick, successive impacts drowning out any laughter the two mech pilots shared.

Then it was dwarfed by a much larger sound.

The gates of hell opened behind the Centurion and its companion, as Atun stared into the barrel of its auto-cannon the pilot inside recoiled in pain as a bright light burned the image of molten metal into his mind, the shards of a blast door flew past and carved a deep red hot gash into the ground. The vanguard of a impending wave of fire and death, the roar of compressed and volatile plasma shooting out of the furnace and out into the open impotently whilst simultaneously ending all arguments as to who was the loudest.

The air temperature skyrocketed, so too did the internal temperature of the Centurion and Javelin. The bloated fusion engine inside each respective mech shut down in quick succession, heatsinks unable to cope as the mech's began to glow a soft red, washed in the warmth of gaseous plasma that rivaled that of the sun. It took almost two seconds for both mechs to shut down, a further two seconds before the furnace itself engaged its own worn and decrepit safety systems. Massive blue pipes overhead flushed sub zero coolant fluid into the massive room, steam billowed from cement and metal alike as the whole refinery wing shut down.

_"Jacob, get in here now!"_ Janos choked out, sweating profusely his Scorpion began to crawl forward, barely surviving the heatwave without shutting down.

Tracks creaking ominously, the Scorpion crawled and limped its way to directly in front of the Javelin, the massive missile system strapped to its turret sluggishly directed itself to the cockpit of the mech, as its systems desperately vented heat to prevent its own shutdown.

Jacob rushed in moments later, his mech staggering back as it hit a wall of warm air. His own heat levels rising, but within tolerable levels Jacob carefully pushed his mech into its usual shambling gait right up next to the Centurion. Carefully bringing the particle projection cannon upwards, he pointed it up at the 'head' of the Centurion, his own mech not high enough to reach the head of the mech instead decided to nestle its weapon below its chin. The point well put across.

**"Sur..dur.. ow.. a.. ou.. will.. ..ared."** The low quality external speakers on his mech struggled to voice Jacobs words as it slowly distorted and melted, but the command was understood leaning back into his seat, Jacob sighed and breathed deeply, the warm air drying his lips and causing them to crack as he observed the two enemy mechs.

Neither mech made any attempt to restart their fusion engines, painfully aware of the twenty rack of long range missiles pointed directly at one cockpit, and a particle projection cannon prepared to remove another. The temperature began returning to normal within a few minutes, the sizzling of molten materials joined by the sudden sound of depressurizing seals as the cockpit of the Javelin opened up, soon joined by the Centurion's. Both pilots had their hands behind there heads.

Janos popped out of his tank, wearing nothing but his boxers he lethargically waved to the two pilots, rivers of sweat once again pouring off of him.

"You are now prisoners of the Budget Warriors, now hurry up and get down from there I'm dying for a drink."

The two enemy pilots shared an uneasy grin between each other as they stared down at the half naked form of a sweaty man, decided that humiliation was better than death, the two quickly scaled down to the ground floor and were escorted back to the Rusty Nail under the watchful gaze of Jacob.

Wasting no time, Janos lept out of his tank and broke into a furious sprint towards the downed Urbanmech. Running up to the side of its cockpit, he punched in the emergency release code the blistered paint and battered frame completely ignored. Material damaged could be fixed, pilots and friends couldn't. The canopy opened much slower then it usually did, or was it just his perception of time. Janos didn't care either way, beating impatiently on the frame of the Urbanmech he waited for the gap to be wide enough before climb in to check on Atun's status.

Sticking his head into the cockpit, his gaze fell upon the bruised and battered form of Atun, lowering his head Janos sighed deeply, tears welling in his eyes as he reached down to shake the wirey man.

"Atun.. Atun.." He began, gently nudging the still form, "You alive buddy?" hope laced his voice, the canopy slipped into its locked position as it finished opening, a wide open maw, its teeth banks of control panels flashing dimly.

There was no response, Janos poked Atun again lowering himself gently into the cockpit

"Atun!" his voice barely a whisper.

Grabbing his wrist, he checked Atun's pulse, a faint throbbing greeted him in return. He was alive.

"Janos.." the groggy, almost inaudible voice slipped from Atun's mouth "next time.. knock quieter, some people are trying to sleep." A faint smile spread across his face, his lips cracking and a faint smear blood staining his forehead. "And put on some pants."

Janos chucked at first, before his voice broke out into a booming laughter that echoed out into the main bay area, Waving down two Quickcell guards, Janos quickly freed the battered, bruised but alive Atun from his mech and began to take him back to the Rusty Nail.

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Rusty Nail Common Room / Recreation Deck

Amity II, Amity System; February 29th

An ice pack pressed against his forehead, an a crutch constructed out of some stray wire and two strapped together pool cues Atun stepped into the rec hall, bleary eyed and groggy he looked around.

"Whadidimiss" he blurted out, plonking himself down on a bench near the table "Some shouting woke me up" he concluded as he stole a half drunk bottle of alcohol from the hands of a nearby person that he didn't recognize.

Janos shook his head, gesturing to several of the men around the table and to one in particular he began to introduce them.

"These are the fine boys and women of Ravager Command, the lovely folks we just gave a hard thumpin to a day or so ago." A chorus of heads smacked into the table as Janos began introducing them, cries of "Dont remind us, we'll never live it down" joking floated around the room as the surviving mech pilots were introduced, happy to meet the skilled Urbanmech pilot who had downed them.

"This, This is Serge Hansen, leader of Ravager Command." Janos nodded to the rather odd looking man sitting to Atun's right, connecting the dots Atun realized that the man had an odd look on his face because Atun had just stolen his beverage, shrugging Atun extended his hand out.

"Pleasure." He mumbled out, sighing in pleasure as the frosty beverage poured down his greedy gullet.

"All mine." Serge responded, grasping the hand firmly and shaking it twice, "It most definitely is an honour to meet the pilot of a trashcan who can fight and live."

"We won didnt we?" Atun retorted, finishing the last of the drink and throwing it expertly into a bin a few feet away, "Speaking of which, arnt you mad you lost, and some of your men died?"

Serge closed his eyes for a minute, seemingly relaxing before he responded, his soft russian tone quite the opposite from what you would expect from a massive frame like his

"Your new the mercenary business I take it," He began resting his chin on his hands "In this business, men, women, friends and family are all potential casualties, and yes while I do mourn the loss of our fellow brothers in arms we mercenaries in general don't take it out on another mercenary, house units.. maybe." Several soldiers in the back listed off several Capellan and Lyran regiments they would like knocked down a peg or ten.

"If you hated ever unit that inflicted a casualty on your unit, larger commands would have no friends and wouldn't be able to cooperate with anyone." pushing over a pile of papers for Atun to review, he continued "its simple, mercenaries have several in-house rules so to speak, we bargain for our freedom and equipment from each other, paying a ransom and such in respects."

Atun whistled, reading over the documents, happy to be on the winning side as he examined what appeared to be a list of mechs, vehicles, money and a agreement of somesort.

"And as you can see, theres no hard feelings, well no lethal feelings." He shrugged somewhat. "we came, we fought, we were outsmarted and got our cans handed to us by.. cans."

Atun nodded, he could see how this worked out, but something still nagged in the back of his mind.

"What was all the shouting about?" he asked, waving Jacob over and shuffling over somewhat on the large bench he had commandered.

"Ah mun, dat was one of the most funny tings I be seein in mah whole life." Jacob was chuckling as he set himself down in the chair, nodding to the other mercenary commander.

"Ah yes.. About that" Janos also was smiling, so too was Serge. Atun began to think they had all contracted some form of illness while he was passed out, tapping his fingers impatiently on the table, he waited for a explanation.

"Well you see, our contract with Quickcell granted us the rights to take prisoners of war, which in this case are the fine fellows sitting around us."

Atun raised an eyebrow at that statement, looking around he cheekily commented

"Dosn't look like a prison to me."

Jacob rewarded him with a smack across the back, whicih prompted a light yelp from the still sore Atun.

"As I was saying, going by various agreements, treaties and rules of war, I your most benevolent and wise commander negotiated the paid release of the Ravager Command you see before you, in return for a small sum of C-bills, we are being given the mostly intact Commando,the intact stinger I shot down and the Harrasers you and Jacob torched in the initial probe." Janos seemed pleased with the deal, so Atun assumed it was a worthwhile swap.

"So, again who were you arguing with?" Atun asked, still missing several vital pieces of information.

"Were you not listening?" Serge asked, shaking his head in laughter "The head Quickcell man here wasnt too happy about being cheated out of my Centurion and the rest of my commands salvage, in response he began yelling at Kemps demanding his make Janos fork over his payment."

"Ah. and did she?" Atun asked, leaning forward in interest.

Yelping in pain again, as he was hit once again across the back, this time by a much smaller hand.

"No she did not, and she is right behind you." sitting next to Janos, she looked Atun up and down "I informed facility executive Burchalter that Janos was well within his rights to keep his payment, he fired me in response."

"You don't seem to fussed." Atun remarked, looking at Jacob he wondered why the man was smiling and muffling his laughter with his hands.

"Ah, thats because a local unit was hiring, something about tactical officers and needing a driver for some heavy vehicles." A small smirk crept across her face, the first smile Atun had ever seen to have graced her features. Before his own face dropped, and then suddenly became a big grin as he realized where this was going.

"That also means I am higher ranked then you Lance Commander Zu." Atuns head hit the table, which prompted a round of violent swearing and laughter from the assembled pilots as the punchline to a joke long awaited finally fell.

After the laughter died down, and Atun had recovered, he asked another question. Wondering if he would regret this one too.

"So why did you decide to come work for us?" secretly, he wished deep down it was because of him

"Oh, the pay is nice, I get to meet knew people, go to new places and I don't have to deal with Quickcell bureaucracy." he face resumed its stoic posture, standing up she nodded goodbye to the assembled mercenaries before she began to head back up to the command center "I'll go start to prepare for lift off, Jacob come help me."

Jacob nodded and quickly vacated his seat as well, shaking hands with several of the other pilots he ambled off towards the command center, his own slow lumbering gait reminiscent of the mech he piloted.

Atun, once again out of the loop was cut off before he could ask yet another question.

"Amity is lost, League forces are retreating, the Lyrans have the planet. We're leaving as our contract stipulated defense of the Quickcell Factory on League territory, not Lyran." Janos quickly interjected, seeing the look of confusion on his face.

"Aye, You lot will be hitching a ride with us to Stewart, our short contract with the Lyrans is up and I feel it is in my best interests to vacate the system quickly, League space seems nice." Serge quickly explained that they had a waiting jumpship at the Nadir jump point, an invader class with the second half of the Ravager Command already on board. "With the Lyran overlord gone, we have room for some passengers, so we are giving you a lift to help pay our release."

Atun nodded his head in understanding and headed to his bunk, quite content to sleep for the rest of the journey.

* * *

Rusty Nail Main Cargo Bay

Stewart System; March 7th

Jacob wiped his brow on his shirt, and looked around the hangar/cargo bay, various supplies and parts simply lay everywhere, highest in concentration around the five vehicle frames sitting in the corner.

_"Finally, everythings back to normal."_ a brief smile crossed Jacob's face, Atun was hard at work less than four feet away carefully separating layers of armor and valuable components from the chassis of a Harraser.

"Stop daydreaming Jacob, and help me remove this missile pack." Atun verbally prodded, a wrench in one hand as he steadily worked at the bolts and connections holding the turret to the frame of the hovercraft, the top rack had already been removed the replacement armament for the vehicle two pairs of guided technologies twin shot short range missile launchers to replace them along with two whole tonnes of additional armor plating. The week spent in space was well spent, separating from Ravager command a day ago Kemps at Janos's behest put the Rusty Nail in a burn towards the capital city on Stewart, with Janos frequently managing to duck out on work as he had to 'go and organize parts and supplies'.

The 'salvage' from the first Budget Warriors contract had taken them a lot of time to process, out of the four harassers two had been fixed and restored to full functionality, the chassis of the two destroyed beyond repair hover tanks having been cannibalized to fix the other two, while leaving them an abundance of spare parts for the next encounter.

Much to both Atun's and Jacobs dismay, the 'salvaged' commando was beyond their ability to repair, the gyro destroyed beyond recognition had turned what would of been a promising addition to their force into a large tower of parts. With gyro's being almost impossible to come by, and a Lyran one at that. Atun was out voted, three to one to scrap the Commando for parts and use it to upgrade and repair the other equipment.

It took two days to completely strip the Commando down to its component pieces, its chassis sequestered away into the cargo hold. Its myomer muscles draped across containers, armor slabs piled with the rest in another corner. The shattered remains of its gyroscope carefully placed in storage, gyro parts were hard to come by even if it was mostly destroyed, it could be used to fix another mech.

With a grunt, and a impressive display of teamwork yet more parts were added to the growing pile that littered the bay floor, giving each other a cheerful pat on the back Atun and Jacob surveyed there work. Cables and strands snaked there way across the floor, the bulky boxy shapes of several Sureshot six shooters neatly stacked atop each other, barely visible behind the much larger wheeled box that was the Hetzer. Held up by a series of cables and hoists the vehicle was suspended over the spheroid shaped cable covered mass that was the Commando's fusion engine.

Atun had requested, nay outright demanded that supporting technicians be hired at the next planet, this assertion was met by laughter from the other three crew members.

"Really Atun, any technician trained enough to assist in battlemech and vehicle repair or modifications has been snapped up by production companies or house units." Admonished Kemps, contrary to what Atun had hoped, her tough strict demeanor had not gone away. Instead, she was even more strict, pressing Atun harder then ever.

"Ya mun, we be lucky to findin some technically minded applicants on dis here planet." Jacob had remarked.

"Besides, we cant afford extra personnel at the moment." Janos had closed with a sense of finality.

Grumbling somewhat, Atun had resumed his work without complaint that day, instead returning the next morning to voice the same opinion, and the next and the one after that.

Finally, he had a breakthrough. That breakthrough was today.

"Alright alright Atun, We get the point, when we make planet fall we will see about hiring some technical assistants, doubt we will find much anyhow." Janos grumbled, his resistance long since eroded. Kemps was surprised at Atuns persistence, she herself had long ago given up when higher ups refused to see reason. "Now shut up and heave!" Janos added.

The two mechwarriors, one expert technician and one random female crowded around the bulky tube of the Fusion engine and grunted in unison. The bulbous housing scrapped along side the panels of the Hetzer, unwilling to move. But the combined stubborn nature of the Budget Warriors was greater then that of the fusion engine. With a final groan, both human and metallic the larger Omni-150 engine slid into place.

Dropping down onto the floor, Kemps panted in exertion, her hair tied behind her in a bundle.

"How do you men do this.." She shook her head, and rose unsteadily to her feet.

"Easy, we have practice." Atun chanted, wagging his tongue at her he continued "Your the designated driver of this tank now boss lady, so you need to learn how to care for her." Atun started

"Use her" Jacob added

"And love her" Janos concluded.

Kemps looked at all three, before dusting herself off and leaving the area shaking her head, her belief that they were crazy re-affirmed by the events of today.

"Whats with her?" Atun asked, as he stared at the retreating form of Kemps.

"No idea, back to work!" Janos responded, before he made to smack Atun again, spurring the man into action.

"Some days, you just no want to bother some women.." Jacob sighed, before he got back to work, retreating under Janos's glare.

It was another two days until landfall, and there was plenty of work to do. Janos had decreed, in his infinite wisdom and knowledge that much alteration, maintenance and organization had to be done; The Hetzer had to be fully operational before landfall, the stinger was to be repaired and the Harassers ready for use or sale. Between the daily training routines and strategy and tactics sessions he had with Kemps, the grueling physical work out that Jacob put him through and the various tasks Janos had everyone do Atun wondered if he died and had gone to hell in the cockpit of the Urbanmech back on Amity.

Either way, as he stared out one of the view windows, the looming spherical shape of Stewart in the visible in the distance. Atun mused that he would never run out of things to do.

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Nui - Glad your still reading :D


	8. Why is the starting line so far away

_**Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder**_

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I don't own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and an unamused colony of spiders.

Sorry I haven't put up a new chapter in a while folks, but the stories not dead! Just suffering from not enough hours in a day, End of year 12 is having some disagreements with other responsibilities such as this. But here is a new chapter to show you that I am alive and still kicking.

_Rusty Nail Mechbay_

_Zenith Jump Point, Stewart System; March 11__th_

Jacob studied Atun with an almost morbid stare, the much slimmer and agile man was running around the mech bay, from side to side, again and again. Ever since they had entered the system, every morning like clockwork, between the hours of three and four in the morning Rusty Nail time Jacob had heard the soft clatter of feet bouncing off the outside of his door. He assumed it was feet anyhow.

The first time was just after they had entered the system, well the first time he had noticed anyhow. Crawling out of his own bed, and lumbering towards the door in the most quiet and sneaky fashion he could manage, which wasn't that sneaky or that quiet, Jacob sought to investigate the source of the noise, and was quite surprised at what awaited him. Jacob fondly remembered his first reactions to the sights he saw, as he peered into the mechbay that first time only a few 'nights' ago.

"Mother of a cappella loving marik!" He had whispered under his breath, the last person he had expected to see doing anything remotely approaching physically intensive was preforming yet more physical exercise, or what Jacob had assumed to be exercise.

Like clockwork, Atun had woken up at roughly three in the morning ship time, wandered down to the mech bay or cargo bay, which ever was the most cluttered and had begun to do laps of the bay, faster and faster each time. Jacobs train of thought, and reminiscence was broken by a loud grunt as Atun bounced of yet another piece of equipment, pushing himself off of the case, he then seemed to run even harder, his head bobbing and swaying in exertion as he physically threw himself at everything in his path, only to swerve, jump, dodge or avoid at the last minute. Jacob compared Atun to that of a cat, gracefully vaulting or sliding under obstacles. This was strange, considering in the time he had known the draconian mechwarrior he had never seen him willingly do anything that would be considered work.

Sliding along the floor, Atun slipped under several suspended armour plates, before swinging himself into a upright position, this repetitive and random display of athletic ability continued for another hour, eventually culminating in Atun slowing to a stop, stretching and bending his arms and legs, as not to fall prey to body racking cramps.

Taking this as his que to leave, Jacob quickly and as silently as he could manage headed back to his cabin, shaking his head in disbelief. However, he failed to notice Atun suddenly looking around like a child caught with his hands in the cookie jar. Too focused on his own thoughts, he didn't hear Atun's quiet voice as he left the bay area

"_Doesn't he know it's rude to stare...?"_

_Rusty Nail Recreation Hall_

_Zenith Jump Point, Stewart System; March 11__th_

Janos yawned loudly as he gently floated into the recreation room; rubbing his eyes, he wished it was cost effective to conduct half burns to simulate gravity. In deep space, vessels had no up or down when not under thrust, and as the Rusty Nail was docked with a jumpship and not under thrust. Well, there was very little gravity almost none. The only gravitation force felt was 'left' which was towards the jumpship as it slowly span in space.

His half-awake waves and good mornings were met with bewildered expressions from the rest of the budget warriors.

"Even I'm awake." Atun said, looking Janos over and wondering why the man was still sleepy.

"I may not have been here very long, but I sense that if Atun is awake and conscious and you're not that there may be a problem." Kemps chipped in helpfully, dutifully sitting in one of the seats, awaiting Atun clad in an apron and smock to serve he breakfast.

"Ya mun, dis been seriously bad news or someting." Jacob leant forward, interested in what Janos had to say for himself.

"Or I could have just had a late night." Janos remarked as he waved them off and took a seat, the assembled trio resumed their previous activities and Jacob leant back into his seat.

"Lies all lies!" Atun chanted, brandishing a half-eaten piece of bacon at Janos, waving it threateningly.

"Well… Maybe something did come up.." He shamefully continued growing tired of Atun chanting lies in the background while eyeing his own foot with a suspiciously high level of interest.

"Iknewit!" Was the only response, and typically it had come from Atun.

"Spill it mun!"

"Yes oh wise and wondrous leader, do indeed tell us." Kemps quipped, riding behind Jacobs statement.

"Well, Your old employers; Quiksell have put it out in un-official circles that we're un-reliable scumbags all prospective contracts in the inner sphere dried up, and I have spent the last four days in transit to, from and on planet discussing legal action with comstar, but since it's all off the record we can do nothing." Jacob half sighed, half sobbed.

"What? So this is gonna be de end of the Budget Warriors?" Jacob sombrely asked, looking around "I just startin to like you all." He chuckled sadly.

"You mean there's going to be no more work? No more money? We're gonna split up?" Atun cried, bacon completely forgotten. "But what are we going to do?"

"They couldn't have possibly run off everyone looking for mercenaries!" Kemps resolutely stated cutting off Atun as he continued his hysterical babbling, "You said everyone in the inner-sphere had been run off, who hadn't?"

Janos stared glumly at his plate, meekly answering "The Periphery."

"Whats wrong with that?" Atun asked, as far as he knew it was just a bit backwater but probably not that bad. "It's still work!" he continued a moment later, "and work means cash!"

"Atun mun, you don't understand, the Periphery is where desperate, cash strapped and close to dissolution mercenaries go as a last resort." Jacob quickly elaborated what mercenaries in general felt about the Periphery.

"Well… They can't be all bad!" Atun retorted, "Do they pay?"

"Not as much as inner spheroids" Chorused Jacob, Janos and Kemps

"Do they offer salvage rights?"

"Slightly more then others" again came the chorus of voices.

"And do we fulfil any of the above mentioned qualities to qualify for Periphery job hunting?"

"Yes..." They group gave a collective sigh, "Atun, We see your point." They slumped back into each of their own respective chairs, having lost this particular battle.

The group ate in comparative silence for the next few minutes, none of them willing to break the seemingly depressive mood. Until Atun, with his usual tact and with as much grace as a drunken goliath pilot blew the silence out of the water.

"So what jobs are on the table?" Atun casually remarked, packing the dishes away and letting someone else do the washing.

"Well…" Janos began, twiddling his thumbs as a means of passing the time as he struggled to remember the details, "There was a raiding contract from that pirate kingdom, whats it called.. the Marian Hegmomy or some such."

"Pass." Both Jacob and Kemps shouted "We are not fast enough, nor mobile enough" Kemps elaborated upon seeing Atun's confused face.

"Plus our mechs be lackin hands don't they Atun?" Jacob chipped in, refering to the Urbanmechs lack of hands. "And the Stinger we got aint much of a fighter either."

"Well discounting raiding missions, there's nothing but short term rotating garrison contracts, with possible adventures from the wonderful Canopians and Taurians." Janos ticked off his fingers as he ran through the list of prospective employers.

"Well that doesn't seem too bad…" Atun tentatively commented, looking around at the others and gauging their reactions. "From where we are, Why not sign on with the Canopians for a bit, from what I've heard they seem nice."

Kemps inquisitive stare sent a bright red flush up Atun's next and across his face, muttering under his breath he decided to study an interesting spot on the floor plating instead of responding. Jacob however, came to his rescue after he finished laughing of course.

"Well, let's have it then mun." Jacob asked, once again leaning forward, for what he hoped would be the last time, his backing having gotten too well acquainted with the seat during almost zero-g movement. "Lets go find us dem contracts."

With a nod from Janos, the trio removed themselves from their seating, and began to half float, half scuttle along the walls in low gravity towards the bridge of the Rusty Nail. With another day before the jumpship they were attach to could leave the systems, Janos reasoned that there was sufficient time to check out contracts, and then send a message of acceptance to Comstar to pass on to whoever they decided seemed nice enough to be their next employer.

With several loud grunts, Jacob squeezed himself into one of the chairs, his well above average frame having yet another disagreement with the _Rusty Nail's_ furnishings.

"Janos mun, we need to be getting some chairs that I can be fittin in confortably mun." Jacob groaned, and with a squelching sound that wasn't quiet right stopped moving.

"I'll put that on the list of things to fix, buy, steal, salvage and replace." Janos half heartedly responded, casually dismissing Jacobs concern with a wave of a hand, his other already scouring the communications console for the recorded logs of his communication with Comstar.

"Found it!" Janos triumphantly announced, the trio surrounding him simply glared in response, they had waited well over a minute. Discontented mutterings of poor service and uncomfortable chairs were summarily squashed by the sudden sound of someone clearing their throat. Coughing as he pulled up the first contract on screen Janos further elaborated on some of the things he had mentioned earlier.

"Right, as I was saying.." He began, pausing to look and make sure everyone was focused and paying attention, finding a satisfactory level of both he continued "Discounting the raiding contracts from the Marian whatsyoumacallits we have a short term garrison contract with the lovely House Centralla, thats the Magistry of Canpopus for you in the back." Janos aimed his last comment towards the somewhat vacant stare of Atun.

"What? I knew that." He muttered, shuffling forward to get a better look, and de-isolating himself.

"Riiiight, anyhow their offering well below average pay.."

"Boo, they suck!" Atun quickly interjected, prodding Janos to skip to the next one

"But they are offering seventy-five percent salvage rights with first choice to us, however we wont be able to procure replacement parts from their supply division. Not to mention their home defence industries have high tariffs.."

Kemps studied the wording of the contract intensively, searching for any sign of mischief, trouble or indentured service. "It seems legitimate, they will pay for hand off expresses to the border and then Canopian military jumpships will take us the rest of the way."

"Hand off express?" Atun asked, looking towards Kemps for enlightenment, at the same time sighing deeply. Why was there so many things that he did not know, or understand. Couldn't the universe be kind and just let him be omnipotent.

"Atun, thats when we arrive in a system and re-attach to another jumpship for immediate jump, or close to it." Kemps responded, her usual lecturing tone making another debut, although they were becoming less frequent as the days wore on.

"Dont that be seein a tad desparate?" Jacob asked "Seems like they think some trouble gonna be happenin."

Janos shrugged, "Thats the buisness my friend. Merc's like us are only wanted where there is trouble."

"Anything else we should know about?" Atun once again asked, this time however Kemps viewed his question with slight approval, captalising on this minor victory he flashed her a charming smile, only to be thrown back with her usual icy cold glare.

"Hrm.. not much, we have the usual standard retention and extension clauses, not to mention we can negotiate for escape clauses upon contact with our briefing officer.. whatever the hell that is." Janos flicked his head back and forth, eyes darting across the screen ferreting out anything that might cause his unit, and his friends undue harm.

"Aha, lets see.. it says here we might be called upon to partake in simulated combat exercises with local planetary forces, running OpFor or defensive." Jacob pointed out the small sub-paragraph with a happy smile, with the rest of them leaning in to take a closer look.

"I see nothing to be worried about, do you?" Atun interjected, breaking the train of thought of Kemps and Jacob.

"Nah mun, seems ok." Jacob replied, grunting loudly as he removed himself from the chair, "Seems like we found our contract."

"Considering the Taurians are xenophobic nuke toting freaks, yea.. I'd say we found our contract." Kemps yawned, stretching her arm as she further elaborated her thoughts. "The contract doesn't have any nasty contractual pitfalls and we will be able to retain command authority, which is nice."

"It's settled then!" Janos cheerfully exclaimed, his earlier depression and sadness completely forgotten, instead replaced with his usual over enthusiastic approach to something which resembled life. Atun barely had time to say something, which was highly irregular before Janos had time to dust his hands.

"Wha?" Atun half drooled, looking at the smirking Janos, "What did you do?"

"I sent a confirmation letter to Comstar, We'll be in canopian space in a few weeks. Toodles!" Janos chuckled and quickly left the room, Kemps soon followed muttering under her breath about crazy technicians and incompetent pilots. Jacob simply looked at Atun, cocking his head to the side slightly he said a single phrase carefully.

"Can you help me get out of this chair mun?"

_Rusty Nail, Union Class Dropship_

_Space and Time Montage!_

The days following the contract's acceptance were filled with moderately frantic activity, every day like clockwork Atun would arise far ealier then any man or woman thought possible, conduct a seemingly random regime of physical exercise and retire to his room hours later, He was of course observed intermittently by Jacob whenever he was woken up, the sound of a rebounding Atun occasionally awoke him from his slumber.

The 'days' aboard the_ Rusty Nail _were filled with the same boring monotonous routines that would send even the most die hard uptight person insane, well that was the viewpoint of three quarters of the crew. The remaining quarter however would adamantly state, with surprising conviction each time that "When its boring, it means we get to live. Excitement usually leads to a quick and explosion filled and or machinery failure fueled death." The usual response was followed by a quick smack to the back of the head to whomever decided to pester the irate technican.

The event that garnered the attention of anyone, even Atun was when Janos had requested everyone's help in removing the remnants of the _Rusty Nails_ meduim autocannon batteries, the decaying, rusted and broken machinery was promptly broken down into scrap, anything usable was re purposed for other parts of the vessel in dire needs of repairs.

"Sooo.. Why are we removing these?" Atun remarked, depressing the communication devices activation stud on his wrist, watching the space suit enclosed form of Janos hovering less than five metres away from him.

"We can always use more space, more importantly we can stick functioning weapons in their if we every salvage any." The static laced voice of Janos chipped unsteadily into his ear, Atun nervously checked the seals of his space suit. Like everything aboard the dropship, it was old and worn. Hopefully it would hold, after all if the vessel had survived the fall of the star-leauge, it could survive indefinitely. After all, it was a source of pride that Janos had won the rights to the thirty second union drop ship ever produced in a black jack card game from a descendant of the original ex-star-leauge defence force captain.

"Riiight. But cant we do this from the inside?" Atun once again asked, gently smacking the rusted hull mount of the auto-cannon with the side of his wrench "Seems dangerous on the outside." He chanced a glace towards the Merchant jumpship that the union lay docked to.

"Nope, these weapons are not accessible from the insides of the ship, baring ammunition feeds. Plus, I dont feel like testing out the _Nail's_ internal pressure bulkheads until we get some new ones." Jano's reply was a mix of his usual enthusiasm, and prayer regarding the health of his vessel.

"Right.." Atun was not reassured in the slightest, returning to his work until he noticed 'down' hull from him two more space suited figures, a large slab of metal suspended between them. Atun watched in interest as Jacob and Kemps slowly patched over several of the smaller gouges and tears in the _Nail's_ hull, the bright sparks of a fusion torch welding the new additions firmly in place.

"Ehhh.. Not the best work I've seen, but it will do." Janos commented over the open communications system, floating down to observe the work. "Your coming along quite nicely as novice technicians." Chuckled to himself, albeit inaudibly through the depths of space he quickly scuttled across the hull to resume liberating another auto-cannon from its mount.

Like ants over a semi-crushed ant hill, the quartet struggled during the 'day' to repair the old battle damage to the dropships hull, bereft of a dedicated dockyard and experienced personnel, they laboured long and hard under Janos's direction to simply patch over minor hull damage without compromising flight integrity.

"Janos, I would like to say that it is quite definite, that I hate you." Kemps groaned, floating dead in space within the recreation hall of the _Rusty Nail; _Atun and Jacob not far behind her, gently floating along and trying not to move so much. All three simultaneously wondering how zero-g work could still be hard.

"Ya mun, I have to be agreein with the littal lady, why we be needin to do so much work?" Jacob asked to Janos, although his current facing would indicate that he had phrased the question to the light switch.

"Well, for starters the aft bay area had about ten percent of its armour left intact, so it needed to be fixed anyway and we had spare plating, granted not of the same make.. but it works." Janos was the only one of the four to float into the room with any sense of purpose, displaying a full range of movement without pain, unlike his fellow companions.

"Also, we need to make a nice impression, so we're going to be painting our emblem and re-doing the whole in a nice shiny grey colour," He produced a small receipt, having struck a reasonable deal with the Jumpships captain; trading a case of finely aged wine for a significant quantity of paint.

Atun, Jacob and Kemps groaned simultaneously at the thought of work, and for the first time since she had joined the fledgling mercenary company, she truly felt like she was a part of the group. Attempting movement, and wincing from the severe pain, she realised maybe she would prefer not to be considered part of the group.

He momentary crisis of conscience was abruptly ended when Atun began slowly nudging and guiding her down the hallways towards her own quarter, before she had time to thank him, or even think about what had just happened he had darted off stealthily, if not for the constant cursing and grunts of pain. When under the employ of the mercantile and competitive Quiksell, no one had helped her before.

"Being apart of something.. instead of working for something.. is nice." Her deliberation and thoughts resolved, Kemps promptly fell asleep the moment her head hit the pillow near simultaneously with two other heads, one large and full of shaggy hair, the other small and topped with a small crop of black hair.

It was with very little fanfare that a single grey dropship detached from its much larger jumpship parent and made a small burn towards another one. Very little fanfare was seen nor heard when the sphere shaped dropship docked with another larger vessel, taking a place inbetween two small boxy shaped vessels which were easily recognised as a Leopard Class Dropship, Carrier Variant.

All this lack of notice, attention ceased the moment the airlock seal's hissed open, surprise overcame the authorative voice and it stopped mid sentence.

"Welcome to the Magistry Armed Forces Jumpship _Pleasure Within... _What the hell is that?" The man pointed to the small patches that adorned the flight suits of the four figures that greeted him.

"Whats it look like blindass." Atun helpfully chimed in, proudly displaying the logo of his own creation.

The bright image of a small Urbanmech, surrounded by money standing proudly infront of an Atlas class assault mech, the words "_**Victory no matter what the cost. (Minimum charge of 1,000,000 C-Bills)**_ sowed delicately under the image as it sat proudly on the chest of the four men and women of the budget warriors.

"We really must be getting desperate..." Was the mans only reply, offering his hand to Janos as deep down, he began to cry.

The Jumpship _Pleasure Within_ left the local region of space with a large burst of electromagnetic radiation, the ensuing static did little to burn away the image of a crudely painted, yet significantly larger version of the Budget Warriors logo from the eyes of the newly arrived jumpship's crew.

_**Writers Note.**_

The Authors of every single fanfic which had me scrolling down for half an hour to get to the next page has my eternal, everlasting and full respect from every cell of my body. Goddamn writing is harder then I thought it would initally be, four thousand or so words is barely a flick of the mouse scroll wheel.


	9. Where Am I, I Think I'm Lost

_**Budget Warriors: Your Equipment is built by the lowest builder**_

Writers Note/ Disclaimer: I don't own anything battletech related, except possibly a noxious green cloud, an old mattress and an unamused colony of spiders.

Aha! A new chapter, up in quasi-decent time. No Misjumps. Totally. Ehehehehe. *works on next chapter* Sometime in the next few months I am pondering a rough plot outline of a Clan Hells Horses fiction or a Battletech/Stargate Fanfiction probably the BT/SG one.. Need more grounding on clans before i attempt that.

Also! You wondrous People, please read and review. Also revised edition of 1st Chapter mark II is up.

_Pleasure Within_

_Invader Class Jumpship – Pirate Point, Thraxa System_

_May 13__th__ 2972 Tactical Briefing. _

"You know what I think of you, and what I think of this assignment and what I think of the as-, err I mean brass back home." Both the voice, and the long cane like object came down like a whip onto the table, Atun spun around, lowering his head in shame from his momentary lapse of concentration. "But, as I have said many a time; I am a benevolent dictator, and I will give you a fair go." A round of snickering filtered around the room with Atun not taking part this time, through a monumental amount of self-restraint

"Can we get a move on? I have things to do Jeremy." Janos grumbled, flicking at the small temporary insignia that was his new rank badge, eyeing up the man standing at the podium. Unhappy with the temporary command arrangements, while the Budget Warriors were allowed to maintain independent operations for the duration of their garrison contract, Janos had been convinced into temporarily handing command to Dixson for the simulated exercise in exchange for some equipment.

"Very well." Jeremy sighed tentatively, "Remember who's in command here!" he thumbed his rank badge, the small diamond insignia clung stubbornly to his uniform as he fiddled with it. "As I was saying, The lovely ass.. I mean brass back home, have decided that it is high time to reinforce our sisters and brothers on Thraxa, and by reinforce I mean reinforce as much as a company of light mechs can do." Whistles and catcalls sounded from around the room, as soldiers and mechwarriors alike voiced what kind of reinforcing they would like to do to their brothers and sisters on planet.

"But before we can do that, We. Have. A. small. Problem." He clicked a small button on the podium; the projector in front of him flashed a series of images on the screen filling the massive white wall with images of mechwarriors and their machines. "Boys and girls, I introduce you to the men and women of the Thraxan Commando's the local planetary milita, and members of our fine MAF."

Atun leant forward in interest, this was new news to him, granted many of the crew and magistry pilots had been whispering about a simulated training exercise, but it had been dismissed as pure whohah by the young draconian time and time again. In hindsight, Atun realised he probably should of listened more to the magistry personnel, turning his attention to the personnel around him in order to catch some gossip. After the initial introduction both sides had quickly realised just how formal the other truly was which in both cases was not at all. The frosty truce between mercenary and house pilot quickly dissolved under the strain of beer and gambling.

"What's the problem?" Atun asked, a smug smile creeping onto his face "Their CO reject your date offer?"

"No! They insulted our manhood, your manhood and the manhood of any man you thought was manly." Dixson replied, before hastily adding "and our fine female pilots womanhood." Nipping the growing complaints from his female mechwarriors in the bud.

"Ya not be talkin any sense mun," Jacob began, as he leant back and enjoyed the bigger chairs of the jumpship, "Whats this got to do with me and de littal mun." he pointed to Atun, who had suffered another bout of in-attention in the short span of time.

"While I may resemble that comment, I at least can see directly in front of me." He retorted snappily, pulling a small tuft of his black hair down infront of his own eyes, before being smacked over the head by Kemps who was steadily growing more red with each passing moment.

Clearing his throat, "Ahem." Commander Dixson continued his explanation and ignoring the bickering warriors, "In order to prove who is the superior unit Me, your glorious and valiant leader and their CO have arranged a series of simulated exercises, We the wonderful _Flying Sixes_ will be assaulting Thraxa with support from the _Budget Warriors_ and the despicable and moderately attractive Commando's mounting will be mounting determined, but utterly futile resistance."

Atun nudged Jacob, tilting his own head up to meet the downwards tilt of the much larger man, whispering into his shoulder "Psst, Jacob, why don't we have a cool name like that." To his credit, Jacob merely looked downwards and whispered back to the top of Atun's head "You ain't good enough yet."

Choosing to ignore the rude behaviour of the budget warrior's only mech pilots, Dixson went on to outline the battle plan. "Alpha and Charlie lance will be on board the Leopard class dropship _Poke Em In the Face_ and _Her Majesty's Will_ respectively, Beta Lance, half of you will be hot-dropping with the Budget Warriors into the designated zones here, here and here" His cane served as a pointer, smacking several enlarged red circles over the projected map repeatedly.

"The other half of Beta will be deploying via ground with the heavy vehicle support from the Warriors Union dropship." Pressing the button repeatedly, Dixson waited for the next slide to appear, the screen blanked to a white blurr as an error message appeared momentarily.

"Windows 2500 Has stopped respondin…"

A rapid strike from his cane to the projector quickly resolved the issue before any of the assembled pilots had a chance to cause a ruckus, the image of a pair of vehicles appeared on the map, two blinking icons representing the mech's of the _Flying Sixes _inassuming escort positions.

"Much to our dismay, the mech's and vehicles of the Budget Warriors will be the heaviest thing on planet, which puts it in our favour, however the Thraxan Commandos have superior numbers, two light mech companies with nothing above twenty five tons, with light and heavy vehicular support." The cheering and wooting suddenly stopped. Two mech companies and a few battalions of light support vehicles? That bordered on near impossible for a single company of mechs to overcome.

"Uhh… Temporary Boss mun," Jacob began, waving one of his massive hairy arms above his head "Metinks you are slightly over estimating our capabilities." Atun couldn't help but chip in, adding to the overall air of sudden cowardice "Ya, I suck."

"That had been taken into account, their armour support is scattered all over the planet due to their need to defend multiple objectives, and the highest concentrations is located near one of the planets ammunitions dumps and the capital. We'll be 'hitting' the ammo dump first, simulating a torch of the place and sacking of the munitions factory before moving onto the capitol which is approximately a day's march away"

Several objective markers began to highlight both targets and pathways, indentifying road ways to use and which to avoid. "Now, we'll be using marker ammunition and powering our lasers down to minimal, so no physical combat, no collateral damage and above all else. No Defeat!"

"Comprende Muchachos?" enunciating his point with an over enthusiastic Mexican accent, as he turned to look everyone in the room in the eye at least once, and in the case of Kemps, roughly eighteen times. With the official briefing continued, the assembled mechwarriors of the _Sixes_ and the Budget Trio ambled towards the collared portions of the hull, making the short journey between the jumpship to the dropships which hung like parasites from the hull of the _Pleasure Within. _The dropships themselves detaching moments later and heading towards the planet at full thrust, seeking to arrive within the next twelve hours and with the element of surprise.

_Rusty Nail_

_Union Class Dropship, Thraxan Orbit_

_May 14__th__ 2972 Hot Drop. _

Atun quickened his short hops from wall to wall, catching up mid-bounce to Kemps and Jacob as the now trio deftly floated through the innards of the _Rusty Nail_. "Umm, guys?" Atun asked, a nervous tone edging his voice as he effortlessly bounced off of another faded grey wall, "I've never hot-dropped before."

Jacob turned as he sailed down the hallway, a magistry mechwarrior hastily removing himself from the path of the much larger man, "Dun worry mun, there be nothing to it." Jacob began as he grasped onto one of the rails and slowing himself down. "Ya just got ta keep calm an all, not ta mention to keep your 'ead in check."

The two nearby Magistry mechwarriors made passing comments as they floated towards their mech cubicles, already vaulting the distance to the ceiling and entering their mechs, a crimson painted stinger and a polka-dotted wasp. "Just remember to fire your jets during the descent, and fly like a brick!" the first yelled, the canopy to his stinger snapping shut with a hiss.

"Yea, remember feet first from the heavens, face up to the skies me boy, aint nothing to it." The second hooted the useless advice floating in the cavernous bays of the union, his own cockpit canopy shutting seconds later, leaving a confused and flustered Atun to float up to his own mech's cockpit. Grasping the hard, steel control casing he keyed in his access code, Atun glanced to his right, freshly painted onto the front right side of his Mech were several small murals, a light mech and a vehicle.

Bringing his finger tips to his lips, he quickly pressed it to the two kill markings before hopping into his mech and closing the connection to the outside world. The communicator crackled to life, the patched together radio emitting a certifiable migraine inducer of a squel before the voice of Janos came across.

"Hey, this is my tub, my rules. So sit down and shut up!" The sound of boot connecting with shin echoed over the communications systems before Janos resumed talking. "Rightyo lads, check in, this is Budget Actual to all units. Report."

"Beta Two-Sixer, ready to burn."

"Beta Three-Sixer, Hot and ready to trot."

Atun quickly fumbled with his own communicators system, flicking and powering the transmitter up before hastily responding "Warrior One, ready to fly."

"Warrior two, Aye been ready to rumbal an ting." Jacobs deep voice rumbled out through the tinny speaker, coming out more distorted than usual.

"Budget Actual, systems are a go. Cargo secure and operational." Kemp's voice joined the chorus of battle ready affirmatives.

"Allright lads and ladettes, give em hell from me." Janos chuckled, and prayed deeply for luck as the drop chutes slung on the underside of the union opened up, disgorging its deadly payload to a freefall towards the planet's surface. A series of rumbling magnetic clunks filled the ships interior as the four mechs suddenly entered low atmosphere, the union; now above them, quickly rocketing off towards the landing zone to deploy its mechanized payload.

"Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww …" Atun screamed, the wind audibly rushed around the outside of his mech as the small urbamech plummeted rapidly, the face of its pilot performing a similar plummet. "Heeeeellllpppp meee!" He screamed again as his face smacked into his control panel simultaneous with his ignition of the jump jets. Three of the four descending mechs closed to a tighter fashion, and gracefully desecended towards the outskirts of a small mining range. The four, the familiar squat dome of Atun's Urbanmech instead rocketed off towards the distance, out of control or ineptly controlled.

_Back in the command room of the Rusty Nail_

"Dammit, Warrior One is out of control." Dixion announced, studying the computer generated map of the area, in particular the blinking blue light that represented the Urbanmech.

"Oh god, is he okay?" Janos yelped, running over quickly to check the screen, his own heart racing and thundering in his chest.

"I think so…" Dixion responded, the blinking icon had come to a sudden stop inside one of the mines that cratered the local mountain range. The light flashed green twice before it suddenly stopped.

"Wassat mean?" Janos asked, his own voice shakey and full of barely contained panic.

"It's an okay signal, it means your pilot's still alive and well. Albiet way out of the mission parameters."

Walking towards the communications console at a brisk pace, he quickly brought up Jacob's mech on a private channel. "Jacob, any word on Atun?"

"Ya mun, he said not to worry.. he be fine, just lost be all." The mirth filled voice of the laid back, probably Jamaican descended pilot brought a significant amount of relief to the rapidly relaxing technician and aspiring tactician.

_Somewhere, near a very large hole._

"Awww for the love of all things crispy and golden." Atun fumed, and swore violently as he paced his mech slowly towards the gaping chasm in front of him. The vast, towering walls of the mountain range filled his sights, but most importantly the small dirt trail caught his eye.

"That's got to lead somewhere.." Shrugging, Atun pushed his mech into a run and waddled the Urbanmech into the mountain pass, his destination unknown. "Why did it have to happen to me."

_Writers Notes:_

Rouge Baron: You don't know how happy it makes me to know that someone considers my writing High Quality. Hehe. Oh wow. Thanks, it's a very nice compliment. I do try and minimise how many times I refer to someone as something, and to limit the amount of times I use a phrase or word in a sentence or chapter, but sometimes It slips past my radar, will do my best to make sure it dosnt happen again :D

Chargon: That's for reading and reviewing, glad you're enjoying it.

Nui: Nice to seem em again? They never left.


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